The Odds in the Gambler
by AmandaFriend
Summary: Spoilerish speculation on an upcoming storyline involving a certain FBI agent and how it might affect his loving family. Suggested by a prompt from Bonesfan 18. Many of the Bones family will be a part of this story because this is a story about a family that is pushed to the breaking point.
1. Chapter 1

**The Odds in the Gambler**

_**I don't now, nor have I ever owned Bones.**_

_**Spoilers ahead. You have been warned.**_

oOo

He's lost just about everything, his wallet filled only with useless plastic, his eye and ribs smarting from a beating that was part of the early warning system of one of the men he owed. He stares at his wife's belly, swollen with their second child, unable to bring himself to look her in the eye. He may trust her with his life, but he cannot trust her with his shame.

"How much do you owe, Booth?"

The words are cold and clinical as if she is requesting some bone details from one of her squinterns. That helps. He tells her the number, then corrects himself, raises the figure by a few thousand as he remembers the other note that is due. A glance up toward her almost burns him and he looks down again at the counter over which he can see the swell of her belly with their child growing inside.

He owes much more than money.

"Will they accept a check?"

If he didn't ache so much right now, he might laugh at Bones' innocence. But he can only shake his head, shake off the idea of her trying to rescue him from his own bad run. A man pays his debts, he tells her, echoes of his grandfather's voice in his head. He's tapped out of everything except empty platitudes.

"I can get the money, Booth."

His pride wars with that idea, dismisses it, but secretly he is relieved.

"The bank will need some early notification for that kind of money."

She pulls out her phone and is dialing a number as he begins to figure a way out of all this. If he can get a stake, get into a groove, find that streak again, keep building slowly rather than try to win it all back at once, then he can. . . .

She's staring at him.

Her words are all Bones: straight and to the point. Stop now and go back to church and his God and his meetings. Stop or she will leave him and take Christine. Stop or they cannot be a family under one roof.

As many punches as he took over the past 12 hours, this is by far the hardest thrown.

"Have you ever known me to say something that I do not mean?"

Her eyes laser in on his, icy blue and hard now. A hand rests on the top of her swollen belly and he has no doubt she knows exactly what she is doing, what asking permission to see his children might do to him.

His mind screams with schemes to win back the money, build back his losses slowly, if only he can get a solid stake, if only, if only. _If only_. Anything would be better than this icy calm, this angry cold.

He dares one more look. She cannot hide her hurt. The ice seems to be melting in her eyes and he can see a hint of tears glistening with pain.

Only one woman can turn his insides to pudding or cause him to silence the voices driving him.

She will go with him to pay back the money, her trust so little now that she will hold his hand as he crosses the street. Hubris wars with reason and he wants to negotiate a different path, but she is adamant.

"I would send Aubrey with you if I could be sure he would shoot you if you started to gamble again."

She looks like she might shoot him herself.

She makes the phone call to the bank and arranges for the money. She will rescue him this time, but only this time. Hard lines return and she does not have to remind him that at one time she refused to talk to her brother for over 10 years. Despite the depth of her heart, the depth of her love, Temperance Brennan still stubbornly serves at the church of reason.

It is now up to him to decide who he will serve.

oOo

**Author's note:** _Bonesfan 18_ suggested this prompt to _razztaztic_ who then forwarded it to me. _Bonesfan 18_ had recalled the image of the poker chips that DB had tweeted out to the cybersphere and wanted to explore the dynamic between Booth and Brennan when Booth succumbs to his addiction.

I know more than a bit about addiction having a father who was mostly an alcoholic.

This will be a multi-chapter piece and I'll do everything in my power to finish it before the show tackles Booth's gambling. I also will get back to _Lies in the Truth_ soon. Real life just interferes far too much with the things I'd much rather do.

If anybody has any thoughts, suggestions, or comments, feel free to hit the button below.


	2. The sum of one's underwear

**The sum of one's underwear**

_Three weeks earlier_

"Captain America wins again."

Hoekstra's given him the nickname, probably because of his cover: he's ex-Army, runs a security firm. The man's been sitting behind a stack of chips that looks like the bad run of the stock market.

Not Captain America. It takes two, three swipes before he claims all the chips in this pot and starts introducing them to the others. His little play has turned into a bull market and he's flush with excitement as well as winnings.

"I need a break." The chair screeches backwards before the man rises. "Phillips, start giving me your hidden stash of cards, huh? New guy orientation is over."

That's Dahlgren, throwing his cards toward the deck, his losses hurting. His eyes level with Booth's. "You're one lucky SOB, you know?"

He knows. It's more than just the cards tonight. Every time he thinks about the baby growing inside Bones, he can't help but smile. Aubrey called it a smirk. But why shouldn't he? He's on top of the world—a wife who he's crazy about and who's crazy for him, two great kids and another on the way, a great home, a good career. Hell, he _is_ Captain America, better maybe, because once he's through working to save his part of the world, he gets to go home.

And Dahlgren? Booth's just too happy to help him give up the chips. Losers tend to lose more than just the pots; they lose their inhibitions as they lose their confidence. He's here to gather information, gather tells to help solve a murder and he's got to see how these jokers handle winning and losing.

He's only too happy to help them with the losing.

"A beer, Booth?"

Braxton's offering a fresh bottle, but he shakes it off, going back to the beer he's been nursing. It's warm, a bit flat, but he's got to remain sharp. He's on a job, a job he does very well. Aubrey had tried to warn him off this, demanded it really like some kind of mother hen, but he's fine, willing to do this until they find the killer. He's just fine.

But he's got to gain more than their money.

Checking his watch he realizes they've only got a few more hands before calling it a night. Mullen is still the only other player at the table, the others off commiserating on their losses. But he's one player who's held steady most of the night.

He leans over to him. "Any of these guys a sore loser?" He shrugs one shoulder, tries to play this hand like the others. "I just want to know if I'm going to piss one of them off if the cards keep coming my way. Don't want to be like old fish."

He's the Cincinnati Kid—no, mark that, the _Philly Kid_—wanting as many aces up his sleeve as he can get.

Mullen riffle shuffles the deck, the sound almost mesmerizing as he does it again and again. "Ryder hates losing." His eyes are clouded from the smoke and booze, but his hands never lose their touch as he waterfalls the cards. "Would hate you've got his seat tonight."

"Shouldn't have gone off and died then."

Mullen lets one side of his mouth curl up as he nods. "Sometimes the cards just play that way."

It's about all he can get from the guy as the others head back to their seats, the break over. He's here to play the people by playing the cards. That's all. Push them to the limit, see what came out when they broke; that's the key, he'd told Aubrey.

He waits as the other players to settle into their chairs, takes up the cards he's dealt, tosses in the chips and thinks that this isn't much of a gamble if you win.

oOo

Bones is waiting up in their bedroom, what looks like an encyclopedia open in front of her, but she doesn't seem to be reading.

"Did you watch the sharks play cards?"

He straightens out the terms with her, amused that this genius woman can sometimes mange the idioms. Still wired from the game, he strips down to his boxers.

Bones gives him that look she usually gives him when he's decked out like this, sometimes like Audrey Hepburn eyeing Cary Grant, but tonight it's schoolmarm Brennan.

"You didn't play, Booth, did you?"

It's a simple lie. "No." He bends to the jeans pooled on the floor and starts to empty the pockets. He pulls out his poker chip. "I'm just there to get a feel for those guys, see if I can catch their tells, see how they lie." The chip goes on the nightstand, a promise to her even if it is a broken one tonight. "It'll take longer this way, but it's the best way under the circumstances."

He leans toward her for a kiss, but she scrunches up her nose. "Have you been smoking, Booth?"

"No." He doesn't have to lie about that. "Rosenthal. Rosenthal was a chimney." A few of the others as well. He gathers up his clothes and heads toward dresser for his underwear before hitting the bathroom. "I'll just take a shower, clean up a bit."

With Christine she hadn't been sick, hadn't been anything but more tired than usual. But with this pregnancy, she's had bouts of nausea and he's not about to push that button tonight.

"Phillips and Dahlgren are in some business deal together," he says as he tosses his clothes in the hamper. "I heard them talking. I'm going to have Aubrey look a bit harder on that."

"They have five marriages and three bankruptcies between them," she points out. She might be in the lab on this one, but she knows the score.

She's also at the doorway, her hair held back in a ponytail, the bathroom lighting showing how the pregnancy is filling out her face just a bit. "You didn't gamble, Booth?"

"No." He smiles to reassure her, to sell the lie.

"Aubrey says that a degenerate gambler making a bet would fall off the wagon in the same way that an alcoholic would if they were to take a drink. Even being around a poker game could cause you to want to gamble again, Booth."

The worry deepens the crease between her eyes, but he's past the first test and he's feeling good. The tension that marked the first few hands, when he was trying hard not to get caught up in what he was doing, had all but disappeared.

He was in control.

"Aubrey's a good partner."

Something in the way she says it catches his attention and he sees just how much she misses being his backup, but they both know there have to be compromises now.

"He's a kid." His attempt at reassurance hides his resentment of Aubrey talking to Brennan about this. "You know me. You also know that I wouldn't do anything to jeopardize this."

He's standing in his underwear, straddling the truth, reeking of smoke and drink and sure that all he's doing is protecting his wife from worry.

There's a beat as she takes in his words, runs them through that computer brain of hers and accepts what he's saying.

"Are you going to wear those to bed?"

She points to the new boxers he's set on the counter, a field of blue with a starred white and red shield. He figures heroic actions require the right dress.

"Bet you can't wait," he teases her as he turns on the water. He's soaring high on the night he's had and the thought of putting his own superhero moves on his leading lady has him almost giddy.

Bones gives him the look, the one that tells him she's willing to play along, and her hand on the swell of her belly gives him the perfect picture of what he wants to protect.

"Don't take too long, then," she says with the first smile of the night as she turns toward their bed.

For his part, he steps under the rain of water to rinse away the cigar smoke, but there's not enough water in the world to wash him clean.


	3. Betting against the house

**Betting against the house**

He makes it into the office that morning only to find it already occupied by Special Agent James Aubrey who can't seem to put food in his mouth fast enough.

Or spit out words just as fast.

"I was thinking about having another go at this underground poker thing. I played a little bit in college, I studied all the tips, watched World Series of Poker, and I think I've got a handle on this. It might not be pretty, but I think I can pass for a while."

Aubrey pauses long enough to get a question of his own in reply.

"What are you doing here?"

Aubrey doesn't flinch. "If someone needs to go undercover, it should be me. I think I could run a simple strategy of folding whenever the pot gets to be. . . ."

He lets Aubrey wind down before he gets down to business. "I tracked down the game last night. Played a few hands, got a feel for the players, went home."

That sets Aubrey back on his heels. He's been Bogarted and it takes him a moment longer to catch up to Booth. "I don't think that was a good idea." His face does a 180. "How'd you even track them down?"

He's been there before, finding ways to lose both money and sleep. "It wasn't hard." A 12-step meeting can be a one-stop shop for where the action is.

But that's not enough for Aubrey. "I don't think this is something you can play around with, Agent Booth. You're an addict and putting yourself into that kind of situation is trouble. You're putting your sobriety at risk. I don't need to tell you that you can lose more than just that."

But Booth feels a sense of control that he hasn't felt in some time. "It's my call. We can't wait on this."

Aubrey's a tough sell. "I know, I know. The first 24 hours and all. But this is a dangerous game you're playing. I'm supposed to have your back and this is your life, Agent Booth."

He's replayed some of the same concerns in his head, but he handled himself well last night and the high of making it out of the game ahead on both information and money just can't be knocked down. "You wouldn't last ten minutes with those guys." Aubrey would be the perfect mark. He'd have him underwater within the first hour. No telling what those other players would do.

"These guys play high society." Aubrey looks confused. "No penny a point, dollar a chip. Five dollar chips and up, no limit. Some of those guys bet what you make in a month."

He's not convincing Aubrey, but he doesn't much care. He's the best choice to hit the tables and get close to the players. "And it would take you a month to find those guys. I talk their language, I know the moves."

He's already compiled a list of names for Aubrey to look into, a veritable who's who of a world he left behind ten years ago. He's also got some insights. "Dahlgren was a bit hot about losing. Apparently he's been losing a lot of late." He lays out another direction for Aubrey to look into, runs him through his impressions on the other players, lets him know he was working the case, not just playing the cards.

Sharp, that's what he is. Professional. He can pull himself back from the edge, keep himself in check.

His steady stream of information works things in the direction he wants to go and he feels the kind of confidence he might have in the interrogation room when he plays the suspect.

Like he played those men last night.

Aubrey makes some more noise about how Booth shouldn't be playing poker, but Booth files his objections in his mental circular file.

"I'm fine. I know where the nearest meeting is."

"Then bring me with you, Agent Booth." It's Aubrey all in, playing the hell out of his hand, but Booth nixes the plan.

"You'd have to play, and I can't babysit you."

The younger agent looks like he's still going to fight him on this, but he's out of both food and arguments when he finally leaves Booth's office.

And Booth?

He spends several minutes shuffling the folders on his desk, preparing to deal cases to other agents for a while, but his mind is definitely somewhere else.

oOo

Even with the pregnancy hormones dulling her thoughts, it doesn't explain why she is so distracted. She stares at the ulna far longer than she should, looks over the marred surface, but she doesn't quite see its significance when her disconnected thoughts are further scattered by an interruption.

"I can call in one of the interns to assist you, Dr. Brennan."

Dr. Camille Saroyan hovers at the edge of the examination table in the Bone Room, her arms hugging her middle as she seems—_what is that emotion?—_slightly bemused.

She ignores the offer of help. Holding onto the ulna a bit longer, her brain finally brings into focus something she should have seen long before.

"The marks to the ulna were made perimortem, probably by a heavy, round object approximately. . . ." In a sense she is thinking aloud, but the disjointed images coalesce into a clear picture of the last moments of the victim's life before the final blow. ". . . The spidery fissures along the skull at that point indicate that his head was struck a glancing blow before the blow that actually killed him."

It isn't delivered with the same precision she prides herself on, but it is enough to satisfy Cam.

"He couldn't fight back."

The bones tell of a struggle to fend off the blows, but hardened steel wielded with passionate intensity trump living bone every time. "He would have been in a defensive posture. It wouldn't have taken more than a single blow to the skull to disable him and then. . . ."

"He was beaten to death."

She finally puts down the ulna. The bones provide a timeline of how Ryder had lived and died, the trauma to his body a final and painful punctuation mark to that life.

"We have cause of death, but not the why." Cam continues to stand at the end of the examination table. Usually at this point, the coroner would turn and leave to make her own report to Booth, but the woman remains.

"It's really not my place, but is Booth seriously considering going undercover on this case?"

The question is asked with a degree of emotion that she cannot read. "He attended the location of the underground poker game night."

She has seen this expression before, the quick closing then opening of eyes, a slight movement of the shoulders.

Then a sigh.

"You didn't know the Booth that gambled heavily, Dr. Brennan. Being in a situation like that is. . . is toxic to someone like Booth."

"Booth said that he did not gamble." The words come out, but they seem off somehow as if she does not have the whole story. "He said he had no desire to gamble, he was simply observing."

Cam starts to say something, but her mouth closes and opens then closes again before she finally finds something she can say. "Booth was stuck in the bullpen because the gambling pulled his focus away from what was important in his career." She pauses. "And his life."

She'd seen her own version of Booth the gambler over the years: a single bet here or there, but nothing like the man possessed by tremors she had seen in Las Vegas all those years ago.

"Addiction has been shown to be at least 50% genetic, the other half a way of coping." Dr. Saroyan's voice takes on that strident tone she uses when she is trying to make her case. "Someone like Booth, with his father's alcoholism and his own history as a sniper, was a perfect candidate for a gambling addiction. A man like Booth holds a great deal in and sometimes that just festers. And given what he's gone through this past year, I'd say he is vulnerable to a relapse."

She takes in the words, but she is not sure what to do with them. She knows how strained his relationship with the Bureau has been, how he still sometimes paces the house at night rather than wake her, how the scars from the attack remind him of what he almost lost.

"There has to be someone else at the FBI who could go undercover and find the murderer, Dr. Brennan. Booth shouldn't be the one to do it. He can't be the one to do it."

Dr. Saroyan does not wait for a reply, but turns to leave, her objections remaining behind, echoing in Dr. Brennan's mind.


	4. House Rules

**House Rules**

He's chasing a murderer and an inside straight when he catches the flicker of something out of the corner of his eye. Under the haze of smoke and another late night, he blinks, not sure he's seen the movement. But by the second time he sees it, he knows that it's not a trick of light.

It's a different kind of trick.

He's somewhere between an FBI agent and gambler right now, walking a tightrope between duty and the exhilaration he feels as the cards come his way.

The light shifts and he sees an orphaned card join a family of cards in Braxton's hand.

It's easy to hide an extra card when everyone's holding five, but the man's playing a dangerous game when he's only holding two.

Scratch that. The man's holding three even if only for a second.

His mind's a bit muddy from the late hour, but he knows a cheat when he sees one and as the extra card disappears into the shadows around Braxton, he does the only thing he can think to do.

He spills his beer.

It forces Braxton from his chair to avoid the rivulet of beer, his cards forgotten for a moment when Booth makes his move, clamping his hand on the man's wrist, freezing it.

"He's palmed a card."

Chairs scrape backward and it doesn't take long to find the card Braxton's scrubbed from his hand.

Or for Sal Piacente to show.

He runs the games, provides the space and the security in the form of two goons bookending Braxton. Piacente's part of the shadows until he's needed. The offending card's been produced, a floater that acts to further incense the players, but Sal quiets them as he orders Dahlgren to divide Braxton's chips among them as an apology.

Braxton's pulled from the room before anyone can do more than hurl insults his way.

And Booth follows.

"What the hell do you want?"

The goon's not friendly, but Piacente's calling the shots here. "Go back to your game. He won't be back."

Booth does his thing, says he's curious about how they handle cheats.

One of the goons manhandles Braxton against a wall. Braxton looks like he's about ready to bolt, but there's nowhere to go. Then a bright flash hits his face and another goon grabs his hand and places it against am electronic fingerprint pad.

"You won't see this guy again," Piacente repeats.

oOo

He slips into the john and texts Aubrey about Braxton, asks him to bring in the man. Then it's cold water to the face and a decision. He could go home, kiss his child and crawl into bed with his wife. He could tail Braxton to make sure no harm came to him. But those thoughts evaporate as he considers his luck that night and how he might catch more than just a cheater.

So he heads back to the game.

oOo

He's rinsed off the smell of smoke and breaking even and crawls into bed, his brain not quite switching off the game, not quite switching off the case when his wife turns to him. He thinks she's just adjusting to the change of weight on the bed, her body in sleep reacting to his, but as she faces him, he catches the light reflecting off her eyes and knows she's been waiting for him.

She's been waiting for something else as well.

"You lied to me, Booth."


	5. Showdown

**Showdown**

The storm clouds outside that night are nothing to the thunder within.

But it begins with Bones' silence.

She's a stickler for honesty and he has only one thing he can say. "I didn't want to worry you."

How can she argue against that? he wonders aloud, pointing out they've got enough to worry about with the new baby, but she's memorized every book on the subject of gambling addiction—every book she could read since she talked to Aubrey that afternoon—and she's quoting chapter and verse.

"You are a degenerate gambler, Booth. You've admitted as much yourself. According to the observed behaviors of degenerate gamblers, being secretive about gambling is a sure sign. . . ."

He tries to wait out the squintiness, wait out the litany of symptoms that don't apply to him, then argues that he's in control. He's only got $7000 from the bureau to bet and he's holding his own. The FBI might even see a profit in their investment he jokes, but his lightness cannot alter the darkness she sees.

"It's just a case, Bones. I've worked undercover before. . . ."

"_With me._"

"I've done undercover work before _without you_," he counters. She does not like this truth, but he plies her with more information, how he caught Braxton cheating, how he's in now with Piacente, how they handled the cheat, what he thinks they can get from him, but Bones will not bend.

"Then you should be working with Aubrey." She is laying down the law according to Brennan. "He should be there with you."

"So I need a babysitter? I can't work this case in the way I think best?" He's about ready to take a turn into another front of the storm when Bones interrupts.

"You lied to me," she repeats. Her anger rumbles in their bedroom. She's Queen of the Squints again, quoting from some Mayonnaise Clinic site's statistics on addiction.

His anger is unleashed when she delves into psychology and invokes Sweets' name. "I haven't gambled in years," he argues, but she corrects him, reminds him of a bet he had with Sweets year ago, reminds him of a wager he made with the woman at the deli a few months back.

"A degenerate gambler would lose money he doesn't have," he points out.

She reminds him that she gave him the money to pay off his debt at the deli.

"That doesn't count." He flashes his frustration. "You need to trust me on this. I'm just working the case and I'm fine."

Her silence is the answer; she cannot trust him.

He's well past cajoling her as the storm outside hits, lightning flashing around them, freezing them in a tableau of discord before thunder rumbles above.

The noise rocks the house and within a few moments, Christine appears at the door, a stuffed duck in hand and climbs into bed with Bones. He bookends their daughter and together, they provide her some comfort from the storm outside even if there is only uncertainty from the storm within.

oOo

Aubrey wastes little time that morning, invading his office and trying to make his case for talking to Bones.

But Booth is well past caring.

"You stay out of my personal life."

Each word is fierce, but Aubrey doesn't even blink.

"I think the fact you didn't tell Dr. Brennan is, well, rather telling. I don't think you can use the excuse that you didn't tell her because she's pregnant unless you're a Neanderthal who thinks pregnant women are incapable of rational thought because by the look of things, Dr. Brennan is extremely rational, the most rational person I the world, pregnant or not." He paused. "Congratulations, by the way."

"In this case, Dr. Brennan's your partner, a member of this team, and needs to know what you're doing." Aubrey stiffens as Booth takes a step closer. "And what you are doing is playing Russian roulette with your sobriety, except in this case, each chamber is loaded."

"What the hell are you talking about?" Booth counters, raw emotion coupled with a lack of sleep breeding a furious stew. _"I'm fine."_

"If you were fine, would you really be doing this?" Aubrey is like a pitbull and just won't let go. "Stephens could have worked undercover, or Van Holstein, yeah, I checked, but you just jumped on this. You should ask yourself why, Agent Booth."

He's not asking anything of anybody right now. The only thing he wants is Aubrey out of his sight. But his teeth are dug in and Booth just can't shake him off.

"I said I wouldn't let you gamble before, but since that cow's out the door, so to speak, I'm going to keep a close watch on you, Agent Booth." He turned toward the bullpen. "I know you won't thank me, but I can assure you that I'm going to have your back."

"Whether you appreciate it or not."

oOo

She twists the wedding ring on her finger, the golden band feeling far too tight right now. Last night's storm has recharged the air with nitrous oxide, making the plants within the Jeffersonian gardens more vibrant and lush, but she isn't here to observe the phenomenon. "I don't have evidence that Booth is bingeing on gambling, Angela, and if I do something he will feel that I do not trust him."

"He lied to you, Brennan."

She scolds herself that she is a scientist, a purist, that evidence is necessary even in cases like these where human behavior is at play – _maybe more so_—but she is torn; of all the people she knows and loves, she trusts Booth the most.

"Cam said that Booth's gambling was so bad that there were agents who wouldn't work with him because of it."

She sighs. "Booth has had few partners."

She knows the story of Parker's namesake, knows that Booth hates being responsible for someone else's life, yet seems to put himself in harm's way for others. He has always been somewhat of an enigma to her, even now, but she knows whatever steps she takes will alter their relationship in some way.

"Aubrey said that I need to cut off monetary avenues to Booth."

Angela's face has been a kaleidoscope of emotions—some she even reads well—but she understands the newest look on her face.

"You have to do what's best for you and your children, Brennan. Aubrey's right." Angela can be very stubborn and now she is holding firm. "Until Booth proves to you that he isn't endangering your financial security, I say do what you have to do to protect yourself."

"I've already contacted my accountant and cancelled Booth's access to my savings, credit and brokerage accounts."

She feels that she is betraying Booth somehow, that she has such little evidence. But she also has a sense that she is simply separating their assets in the same way that she combined them during the summer months when he was imprisoned.

"You should contact anyone that Booth might borrow money from."

The list is small as far as she knows. "I handled his obligations during the summer." Angela gives her a look that seems to invite further explanation. "He sets aside money for his grandfather and for Parker every month. Jared is in recovery and wouldn't lend money to Booth to feed an addiction."

She's been very thorough for someone who has only a lie as evidence. Very thorough. The cash she's held in their safe has also been removed to the bank this morning.

"So what do I do now?" she asks, but she really knows the answer.

Angela supplies it anyway. "You wait and see what Booth does next."


	6. Eye of the Storm

**Eye of the Storm**

She's hot sex in a cool blonde, inviting and off limits at the same time. She slides into her seat and in less than a minute, she's just another card player.

His job is to find a killer. Period.

That's why he's sitting here half the night studying the cards, studying the people, not quite knowing where one ends and the other starts, but it's better than being home where his wife looks at him like he's broken somehow.

When she walks in, she's a fresh breeze in a smoky room and clearly meant to be a distraction for anyone not invested in their cards.

Look, talk, but don't touch.

Phillips ignores the woman. Hoekstra looks more interested in the cards. Dahlgren grumbles and lets his eyes linger a while longer as she lets her scent and her sex invade their space. She's a momentary distraction for the players, a kitten among the wolves, another name to add to the list of people for Aubrey to look into. Another suspect to add to the pool.

He's already squared away the information he's got from the squints and he's playing the cards and winning here because he sure as hell isn't winning at work and definitely not winning at home.

Stark saunters into his office that afternoon and starts jawing about how they haven't had a "good long talk" since he's been back. _Since he's been back?_ Like he went away for summer break for three months and then came back tanned and rested and ready to tackle the world? Fuck no. He was imprisoned on his word and later told that the Bureau made a mistake, the computer files were altered, and blah, blah, blah. Stark who didn't know the names of half the men and women on his watch and when Sweets dies, comes into the office to express his condolences, suggests Booth say a few words at the memorial because the man doesn't even know more than what's in people's jackets.

Or what's in their hearts.

The cards blur in front of him and when they hit fifth street and his the cards in his hand still aren't clear, he folds.

He's here to catch a killer. That's all.

He makes that clear to Aubrey every time the guy brings up gambling. Control. That's what he's got. It got him through the Army, torture, prison, kidnapping, injury, loss—he can handle a game. Play the men, mine for information; he got the memo and knows what he needs to do and he'll do it.

Anthony Ryder's life deserves some closure. Ex-Special Forces, the guy was disabled somehow before he was beaten to death with. . . what was it? Yeah, the old stand-by. Tire iron. Multi-purpose tool.

Sweets could have used it to break the guy's head who broke his heart.

Booth tries to shake it off, takes a pull off his beer, tries to focus on something.

He's here to catch a killer.

Raise and counter raise and he's sure Dahlgren's got the flush as the guy holds his cards closer and seems to concentrate on the cleavage of the blonde. There's plenty of real estate there to check out.

Shake it off, he commands himself. Focus.

But focus is hard to find here. He's not sleeping much, the tension at the house a bit too thick to find any rest. That's why he's coming in late and flopping in the guest bedroom.

That's all he is, isn't he?

Guest to the all-too-perfect Temperance Brennan.

She'll let you know just how perfect she is, just how smart she is, just how many awards she's won, how much world recognition she's earned, just how many damned books she's sold, how much money she's got.

And she didn't allow herself to get sent off to prison. No. She took off, took their kid, ran and didn't look back once. Even solved the crime while she was on the run. Didn't even have to blow up the house he fixed up to do it.

Perfect.

He picks up his new hand and watches as the dealer lays down the third street.

He's missing a plank, but then the Queen of Hearts turns his gunshot straight into a full-fledged straight and he holds on trying to curb his glee.

He understands why Dahlgren tries to get lost in the newbie's blouse.

The pot comes his way and he finds that even in this game he's got a better chance of winning than he does in his life.

Thoughts of catching a killer are definitely on the back burner as the dealer gifts him a pair of jacks and the fifth street becomes an avenue of golden possibilities as the pot grows and he's sure he's got the winner.

He stops thinking about going home anytime soon.

What's there to go home to?

A wife who looks at him like he's a skull she's got to reconstruct and needs a large, economy sized bottle of Elmer's to make him whole again.

Living with that woman can be hard under normal circumstances, but when she begins to believe the crap coming out of Aubrey? What happened to over 10 years of partnership? Trust? Love? Hell, when the case is over and he can lord it over her—_and he is going to lord it over her_—he'll shut that squinty mouth of hers.

The pot comes his way and he knows he can win at poker and solve the case and show them—_show them all_—he's in control.

He's playing the cards and the people here; they're not playing him.


	7. Trailing Winds

**Trailing Winds**

"More kisses, Daddy." Christine looks up at Booth as he straightens from kissing her. "Kiss Mommy, too."

She sees the hesitation in her husband, the lack of eye contract, the tension in his jaw. For more than a moment, she expects him to ignore Christine and take off as he has of late. But suddenly he changes, becomes playful Booth. His voice grows a bit louder, his actions over-the-top. He's got Christine giggling with his antics. The hard look he tosses her way is one that tells her this is for Christine alone.

He's still very hurt and very angry.

She accepts the kiss so as to not upset their daughter. It is not rational, but the touch of his lips against her skin stings.

She blinks back the burning in her eyes.

Booth jiggles his keys and swoops down to Christine's level again to kiss her and promise to bring her something nice before striding from the house.

While he has showered attention on his daughter when he is home, he's said almost nothing to his wife in three days.

She moves quickly to help Christine clear the table and turns to put the juice back into the refrigerator when she sees the photo of the three of them. It hangs next to the grocery list and a phone number of one of the local restaurants, a silent reminder of happier times. They'd simply come from the Jeffersonian on the way to Booth's SUV, when he stopped a stranger and asked him to use her phone for the photo. Booth kisses her cheek in that photo, while Christine is frozen in time looking up at them, her smile infectious and pure.

She lingers for only a moment on the photo.

oOo

"I hear congratulations are in order."

She has heard the sentiment often in the last several days from her interns and co-workers, so she is not surprised to hear Wendell Bray's pronouncement as he enters her office.

"Are you congratulating me because I have found cause of death or because I am with child?"

His grin widens. "The baby, Dr. B. I bet Booth's pretty jazzed about the newest member of the family."

Her mind takes in the information and spits out the only answer she has. "He was."

"Was?" She sees the shift in his expression. "Is something wrong?"

She knows the line between herself and her interns and crosses into new territory instead. "Did you make the corrections in your Michigan consultation?"

She records the shift in emotions as he hands her the file and she re-checks the information that she asked him to do. It takes only a glance up to tell that he is worried by her answer, but she has no desire to open up another front of concern. Yet, when she hands him the file and praises his work, she cannot help but tell him. "Booth is working undercover on the current case."

Reading Mr. Bray has become easier over the years. The worry deepens. "The gambling case?"

Hodgins has told him about the current case, but failed to mention the approach. He leaves it to her. "Booth shouldn't be involved like that. He caught himself when Reid and Brunswick wanted to get up a side bet on the hockey league finals. Said he didn't want to go tumbling down that route again."

"I know you are poor, Mr. Bray, and don't have any money, but if Booth asks you. . . ."

She finishes the thought, earns a promise from her intern, and only knows she can pull the noose only so tight before it strangles her as well.

oOo

She listens for the grumble of the SUV up the driveway, the click of the lock, the soft padding of footsteps that lead down the hallway past her door to a spare bedroom.

These nights grow later and later as Booth leads a double life. She tries to sleep, but sleep eludes her now, even in her second trimester when the hormonal surges have tapered off. Worry, she knows, solves nothing, but each try to derail such thinking with ideas for her book, or mental notes for the paper she is writing, or a checklist for Christine or the house or the case only turn back to her concern for the man she loves. She listens for other sounds within the house, but hears only the water coursing through the pipes, the smothered sounds of sighs and groans and creaks that may only be the house itself shifting with the changes of temperature.

So she sleeps alone these days, much as she did when Booth was imprisoned that summer.

Only now, Booth is in a different kind of prison and she has no idea how to break him free.


	8. Time Flies

**Time Flies**

What begins in the light of one day ends in the light of another and he's losing track of more than just time.

He pulls himself out of the game around lunchtime, well past a decent hour to head home and kiss his kid or let his wife know he's alive. Just enough time to hit the ATM before he heads to the office to touch base with Aubrey.

The cards played him as much as he played them, but he thinks he can win back a little ground if he can just get back into the game.

But that takes cash and more than a little luck.

He's handed over the original stake to Aubrey in a bout of hubris telling the guy that he's going to coast on the winnings he's earned. But somehow the cards weren't whispering to him last night and he finds he doesn't even have much more than a few dollars for lunch at the diner. But he can't go there for fear of who he might run into.

A walk to the car shakes loose a few bad choices and his head's filled with the hands that just didn't pan out for him. In his mind's eye, he can see each play that sunk him, each card that just wasn't good enough and he's already plotting his comeback when he catches sight of a familiar sign.

It might be better than an ATM.

oOo

He strides into her office and she's not thinking about social customs or the kerf marks Dr. Oduya from Sweden has asked her to examine or even if she remembered to close the garage door that morning. There's only one thing she can think of.

"Booth didn't come home last night."

James Aubrey stops in mid-stride and holds up his hands as if he's about to stop a fall. "He was playing poker all night and my guy tailed him to a pool hall. He's hustling bucks from the players there."

"Hustling?"

"Yeah, you know. He's betting on pool with them, shots, games, what-have-you, trying to score some cash."

"I am aware of what hustling is in this context." She's been reading far too many anecdotal accounts of gambling addiction not to know the specialized vocabulary.

"My other guy, the guy I've got on the inside, says Booth lost a ton of money last night. Probably close to everything he's won over the last. . . ."

She cannot wait on his explanation. "If you have an inside guy, why can't that guy work this case?"

"Look," Aubrey says as he steps closer to her desk, "I'd be playing poker in there instead of Booth, but I couldn't even beat a 7th grader online, so I wouldn't stand a chance against those sharps in there. My inside guy is one of Sal's bouncers. Maryland cops picked him up on a child support beef and. . . well, to make a very long story short, he's my inside guy."

"He's a suspect."

"Well, sort of." Aubrey's face muscles contract into an expression she hasn't learned how to read. "His boss, Sal, doesn't use violence because it's bad for business. Gets too much attention, and he's trying to keep everything on the down low."

"Where is Booth now?" She's spent half the night calling her husband's mailbox only to be kicked out of it this morning because it's full. She can't even locate him through GPS without a phone call and since he won't pick up. . . .

"He's still at the pool hall."

"Where?"

She's already standing and gathering her messenger bag, ready to go find Booth and try to talk to him, but Aubrey seems to have a different plan.

"No, no, I'm not going to tell you." He's holding up his hands again. "Booth's going to crash and he's going to need you to pick up the pieces, not push him away by getting in his face right now and. . . ."

"I just want to talk to him."

"Yeah and he's not going to listen. He's going to hit rock bottom and probably pretty hard from the look of things."

"So that's your suggestion? Wait until something happens?"

Worry mixes with a lack of sleep and whatever pregnancy hormones are in play and she's feeling helpless and not a little angry.

"Yeah, that's my suggestion." Aubrey's done little to reassure her, done little to convince her so far. But he stops her easily enough with the next thing he says.

"Booth's a good man. A very good man. That's still at his core, Dr. Brennan." He purses his lips and shakes his head and steps even closer. "This is his fight. I know you want to step in and help him, but he's got to help himself at this point. It won't do any good to try to stop him because he's got to want that."

Waiting makes sense and doesn't make sense at the same time. She slips the bag from her shoulder in resignation.

"We wait," she says finally despite the pull of something deep inside her to go find and rescue him. But she's not up against a gunman trying to kill Booth; she's up against a deep pull within Booth that only he seems able to defeat.

"Yeah," Aubrey says. "As hard as this is going to be, we wait."


	9. Gunshot Straight

**Gunshot Straight**

He's heard the story in slightly different forms over the years, but the message is always the same. A guy's walking to work on one of the coldest days imaginable when he hears a chirping. He looks toward the sound, sees a bird fallen to the ground. Looking around, he sees a fresh pile of shit from one of the horses the foremen ride to work and scoops it up and places it by the bird before heading off to work. The bird, warming up, chirps louder in appreciation. Unfortunately, the bird's cries of thanks draw a hungry wolf that gobbles up the chirping bird.

He first heard the story from a grizzled veteran of Gambler's Anonymous. The guy had won and lost a fortune over the years, won and lost two, no, three families, but always seemed to find a way back to the program, back to sobriety.

"The moral of the story is," the guy tells the small group, "the guy who put you in shit isn't necessarily your enemy, the one who takes you out of the shit isn't necessarily your friend, and when you are in shit, keep your mouth shut."

Booth remembers the story well. The guy who told it, Larry, ate his own bullet just 6 months after first telling it in a meeting.

oOo

It's when he pulls out his wallet to make a small deposit of seed money for the poker game he sees the photo, the one Bones gave him of herself and Christine when he was in prison. Out of habit really, he unfolds it and looks at them, the two of as close as they could be, mother and child, Big Bones and Little Bones. _His_ family. _His_ girls. He can practically hear Bones tell him she's no longer a girl, that she isn't property to be owned by someone, but—_definitions be damned_—that's sometimes how he thinks of her.

_His girl. _

There's so much of Bones in Christine that he sometimes is amazed to see the purity of her in so little a creature. And when he sees sparks of himself in the little girl—his playfulness, his humor, his. . . .

He blinks back something in his eye and folds the picture carefully and lays it next to the bills he's been able to win at the pool hall and closes the wallet.

He suddenly feels very far from home although he's only a few miles away.

oOo

The corner has shadows in which to hide, and hide he does, nursing the whiskey that's supposed to dull his senses, but only seems to heighten the depressing truth of the situation. It is only when Aldo comes over and hovers near him that he can actual say it out loud.

"I lost a hell of a lot of money last night."

Aldo recoils a bit, eyebrows raised toward heaven. He whistles. "Gambling?"

A nod.

"Temperance know?"

All he has to do was look at the man. "Of course, otherwise you'd be home with your wife and kid." He leans in. "You need a meeting, Booth, not a drink."

Something about remembering Larry's story loosens his tongue. "I stopped gambling when I met her."

"Temperance?"

"Yeah. When I first met her, I. . . I just didn't want to anymore."

"What changed?"

It spills out of him, in dribs and drabs of self-pity and self-awareness, how this time he more than slipped, more than found himself in a small pool at work or at the Jeffersonian where he could wade in then jump out without another urge to take a dip until now. Now. Dove right in and thought his head was above water until it wasn't.

Another whistle as his story winds down. The bar is thinning out and he hears a couple of shouts of good-byes as the door closes behind them. "You've told Temperance what happened."

"She knows I'm gambling. I chose to work a case. . . ."

He sketches the details as the last of the late afternoon crowd disappears and he finds himself alone with his confessor.

"How's the murder investigation going?"

It's a fair question, one he's ignored by avoiding the office and Aubrey.

He shakes his head.

"What are you trying to prove, Booth?"

It's another fair question, but he isn't likely to answer it because he's covered it over with a surfeit of excuses and emotions and he doesn't even know where to start to dig for the truth.

He hears the sigh, the one that signals just how deep in shit Aldo thinks he's in. That sigh traveled with Aldo from the priesthood into bartenderhood. He also knows what Aldo's going to tell him.

"You know what you need to do, Booth. Figuring out who killed this gambler is somebody else's job right now." The ex-priest leans in. "You've got to hand it over to someone else and get yourself straight."

"I can't," he says. That thought had come to him as he tried to pad his meager stake at the pool hall. "I have a feeling about this."

His gut's been telling him to look in one direction, but the cards keep pulling him in another.

"Have you told your wife the truth of what happened? Not the how. That's easy. You put down a bet and chased the money until it disappeared and you had to put down another bet to keep it real in your head. What was the thing inside you that you were trying to drown with the gambling?"

Even the whiskey isn't enough for those watery images to emerge. Each one swims past him in blurry details—the firefight, the hospital, the incarceration, Sweets' death—all eluding his grasp in an endless pageant of self-incrimination and painful truths.

"I've failed. I can't stop it."

"Yes, you can. It might have you in its grasp, but you can see everything clearly if you just look deep enough."

"I can win back the money."

"How?" Aldo's voice rises. "You're being chased, Booth, by your own guilt and shame. No matter how much money you throw at it, it ain't going away." There's that sigh again. "How much you lose? What was it? Hundreds? Thousands?"

He gives him the number, the full number. He doesn't tell him how much of the money is his own.

His confessor nods. "You don't need me to tell you this. You need to start being honest with yourself before you can be honest with other people."

"Sitting here and drinking isn't what you need to do," he adds. "You know what you need to do."

"When you're in this much shit, it isn't the time to keep your mouth shut, Booth."


	10. Greek Bottom

**Greek Bottom**

A rational woman, she waits because that is all she can do.

If she believes her friend, Angela, she is waiting for Booth to be the man she knows, not the man who barely speaks to her, not the man who lives in the shadows of her life right now.

If she believes Aubrey, she is waiting for Booth to hit bottom, to lose his stake which may be the only way for him to realize how badly he needs to quit and to jumpstart his sobriety.

But if she believes her heart—_her_ _metaphorical heart_—she is waiting for more than just her husband or lover or friend. She is waiting for the man to whom she had been partnered for over 11 years. She is waiting for his touches during the day that remind her—as if she really needed to be reminded—of what his touches could do when they are alone at night. She is waiting for his smile—that _damned_ charm smile that could get her to do things she didn't want to do. She is waiting for his teasing tone, his gentle tone, his silly tone, his sexy tone. She is waiting for his kiss—not a symbolic one meant to appease their daughter and mock her as his wife; she is waiting for the kiss that comes freely, sometimes heatedly, always Booth's way to reassure her that all this born of love—a child, a home, a marriage—has been gifted to them through a stew of neurotransmitters and something that science alone cannot explain.

She is waiting for the man who leaves his socks just outside the hamper, who wads up damp towels rather than hangs them, who nudges her when she is half-asleep in the middle of the night to talk to her or steal away the covers.

She waits for the man who calls her during the day just to hear her voice, the man who brings home old, sometimes broken bits of things that appeal to him. She waits for the man who scorns computers but talks to his son on her laptop, the man who tickles their daughter with stories and fingertips, the man who spreads his hands over her growing belly and says everything in his silence.

This is the man who holds her when a nightmare rends the tapestry of sleep, who opens up the door to her emotions roiling namelessly within. This is the man who celebrates her intelligence as well as her beauty; the man who loves her, who understands her even when she doesn't quite understand herself.

She is waiting for the man who is more than just her husband, her lover and her friend to come home.

oOo

Tens over fives bring him one pot, but a black Jack ruins his chance at a straight flush. He picks up some chips on a pair of queens, but loses them and more on a king that just wanted to go it alone.

If luck is supposed to be the residue of hard work, then he sure as hell isn't working nearly hard enough.

He's already tapped out his savings and his credit card's maxed to the limit and he watches as most of his chips on this last hand take up residence in front of Phillips. Yet he keeps hanging on, caught somewhere between home and work and a growing realization that he's not quite ready for either.

"You in?"

It's the blonde, Kristal MacKenzie, who's asking and he's about to toss in his chips when Mullen screeches the chair backward.

"Gotta take a leak."

He stays put, reliving the last few hands that have gone south, when a hand covers his shoulder.

"Take a break, guy."

Dahlgren's got a cigar hanging from his mouth, his eyes at half mast from the smoke and the hour. "Hit the can, hit something in the alley, whatever, but take a break. You squeezing those cards much too tightly."

He gulps in some air and pulls himself upright before heading to the back of the house. Out of habit he checks his phone, ignoring the messages from Bones, running through the list of names of people he might be able to borrow a little something from when Dahlgren's at his side offering up a beer.

"Looks like you could use this. Drown the bad luck."

He wants to shake it off, but the cold bottle against his cold hands seems appropriate and he takes a long swallow trying to wash away the taste of losing.

"Let me spot you a couple. . . ."

He knows better, knows the sales pitch well as Dahlgren recounts his history, how he was just killing it earlier, but now his luck's gone cold. "I've been watching you. You know how to play all right, but you're just not getting the right cards. Let me help. . . ."

His gut is screaming at him to stop, but he's too damned stubborn, too damned something right now to listen what with the cards kicking him around and far too many people saying he couldn't handle this and knowing that luck's got to turn around for him, he takes the chance with Dahlgren's loan.

He justifies it by telling himself he still has a murderer to catch.

oOo

She doesn't need Booth to tell her how much he is losing or even where he is at night. Handling their finances during the summer months has given her access to all of Booth's accounts and all she just has to punch in a few numbers and see what damage has already been done.

But she doesn't.

Nor does she need Angela to triangulate a location on Booth based on phone calls.

No.

All she has to do is look at him—the slope of his shoulders, the arch of his spine, the tilt of his head. His gait slows just outside the room before it quickens as if he's trying to pass through their lives with the speed of a thought. Eye contact—something he insisted was important in interrogations, something he always said that she was an A+ student at doing—is fleeting, furtive.

And conversation?

She puts little stock in the dangling conversations that make up the moments when their lives intersect. What is there in his words—words that she knows are fraught with lies—can be far easier for her to discern a different way.

She can read the truth in his bones.

oOo

He's got two aces and fourth street holds a third and the last plank on fifth street might very well be the one that paves his way to a badly needed win.

He needs something to turn around.

For a moment, he sees a happy ending to the evening, a chance to pull out of this losing funk and put some a dent in the interest he owes Dahlgren. A quick sweep of the other players—Mullen's folded early and Dahlgren's about ready to—shows he's up against MacKenzie and Phillips and that damned street of cards.

And he catches the look.

It's Dahlgren doing more than checking out MacKenzie's ample assets and right now he wants to do more than just spill a beer and bring attention to a new brand of cheating.

So he watches.

Dahlgren's tapping his fingers against the table, signaling something and the blonde's pushing the pot higher and Dahlgren folds and leaves it up to Phillips.

A pair of queens take up residence on fifth street and he's practically giddy with the thought of a full house turning his luck around.

He's all in.

It's a seesaw battle trying to out-think the two left. Phillips loads the pot and MacKenzie almost reluctantly follows and with a pot so rich, Booth tosses in his watch and the keys to his car just to stay in.

He's that sure of himself.

Phillips reveals the queen he's been holding and for a moment, Booth sees the pot disappearing toward another end of the table and it's only when he sees a three that he feels like he can relax.

But there's another lady standing in his way.

"Car any good?"

"It got me here." MacKenzie's eyes are leveled with his own and he can stare all he wants, he's not reading this woman well enough to know if he's won the pot. "Call."

She's holding garbage and while he can recall just about every single damn pot he's won, he can't think of any better than this one.

Chair legs scrape against the floor to announce the end of the game and he glances at the time as he secures the watch to his wrist. The car keys feel good in his pocket.

oOo

He's halfway to that car when he hears his name and sees Dahlgren closing the distance.

"You pulled it out there, Captain America." Dahlgren blows smoke from his cigar. He's not alone.

"Thought you'd want to make a payment to cover what you owe."

He didn't win nearly enough to cover that and tells him. But he's talking to the darkness that just seems to swallow his words. So he tells him again.

Maybe it's the hour, maybe it's the high from winning, maybe it's something else, but he just doesn't see the guy circling him and only when he feels his arms being pulled behind him and has his head rocked backward with a fist of pure stone does he realize he's way in over his head.


	11. A World of Hurt

**A World Of Hurt**

He's ready for the first blow, a fist to his stomach, just below his ribs. The second blow practically folds him in half, but an uppercut to his head, landing on the soft flesh around his eye, unfolds him just as quickly. A flurry of blows to his belly ends just as abruptly as it begins and he wonders if they're about ready to pull out the tire iron, the weapon of choice for Ryder. And he waits for the next blow, struggling all the while, hoping he can end this with his life and go home to his wife and kid, a voice screaming at him in his head.

Then he waits.

And waits.

He stops struggling long enough to ease the holds on him and then makes one final twist to break free.

He's so focused on doing this and trying hard not to become another body for the Jeffersonian, he doesn't quite hear the command.

"I said, stop, or I'll end this little party permanently."

He looks up to see Special Agent James Aubrey holding a gun at Dahlgren's head. The two goons bookending him drop their holds and as the feeling returns to his arms, he's not sure if he should be thrilled for the rescue or angry that Aubrey's seeing him like this.

Aubrey gives him little choice.

"I've called for backup of the local police. Assault in the parking lot, three against one, you know the drill." He cocks his head to beckon him to his side. "We're just going to wait on them. . . ."

"He owes me money."

"And you were going to beat it out of him? Doesn't match up with any anatomy book I've ever read."

"I want my money."

Aubrey lowers the gun. "Look, let's be gentlemen about this. Give my friend here 48 hours to get the money to you and let's call it a night."

The glare from Dahlgren says it all.

"Forty-eight hours. Or you'll regret sitting down at that table."

Aubrey stands with him, gun at the ready as the three men fade into the shadows.

Raw adrenaline fuels him as he turns on Aubrey. "If you had the police bring them in we could have searched their cars for the tire iron."

"You're an idiot. Or you really must be in the throes of addiction because you really aren't thinking straight."

The words are like the fist to his cheekbone, meant to snap back his head and leave him disoriented.

"I do that and you won't be the one solving this murder. They'll simply tell the cops you have a gambling debt and you can kiss your career goodbye." Aubrey holsters his gun. "Or they make it about some other beef or you pull out your badge and either way you're found out and they've got leverage on you as an FBI agent and the FBI terminates you."

"It's lose-lose anyway you run it." The pause is so long that he could have scarfed down one of his classic lunches in that time. "Look, I said I would have your back and I have it. They don't seem to be our killers, but I'll look into their backgrounds a bit closer tomorrow. But the best thing right now is to get you home so you can figure out your next move with your wife."

His wife's nickname oozes from his lips like an open wound. Aubrey's rooted to the spot still, his rescue coming at a cost.

"She knows."

It's really all Aubrey has to say.

That knowledge hurts worse than the beating.

oOo

He can't sleep.

Bones will free him of his debts by creating an even bigger debt of just how much he owes her. It's more than just money. But even if he were to somehow pay back every cent, they would never really be even.

He's banished himself to a back bedroom, a bag of frozen peas defrosting on his eye, his sighs reminding him of the ache in his ribs. Those are the superficial wounds, he thinks to himself. The other wounds go deeper, much deeper, and they touch both of them.

Once, he practically blew up his own house for a good cause—to save his life and that of his wife and child as well as to stop a murderer.

Now, he's blown up his marriage and practically torched his career.

His mind replays each near miss of that night—cards that almost came his way, a beating that almost turned deadly, a wife who almost turned her back on him. He's almost solved the murder, almost ruined over 11 years of sobriety, almost destroyed a partnership that's his life and another one that saved his life tonight.

Almost, he tells himself. Almost is only good in horseshoes and hand grenades.

The old joke twists on him, makes him wonder how far gone he is. How far gone his relationship with Bones is. She's sleeping down the hall, her disappointment and mistrust so great that there's no room for him in their bed.

Those same feelings mark the seesaw relationship she has with her father.

That thought propels him from bed to the kitchen where he deposits the limp bag of peas in the refrigerator and pulls out the milk and eggs.

He's trying to focus on making a meal rather than the shambles of his sobriety and the investigation. Cut up peppers and tomatoes and mushrooms. Toss in some onions. Scramble the eggs.

Each step is fluid, precise, leftovers from his time with Hank, learning how to cook, learning how to be a man. He's tested that definition hundreds of times, proved himself worthy of the man he admired and hoped to be. Proved himself to be wanting in the same way his father was wanting. Proved nothing but. . . .

"You should fold that."

He looks up to find Bones in front of him, a robe hanging loosely from her shoulders, her hair mussed from the pillow.

"I. . . yeah. . . right." He tests the spatula at the edge and tosses in some cheese before he folds the egg over everything.

It's a dance of sorts in the kitchen as he grabs another plate and glass from the cupboard and pushes his untouched milk in front of his wife. He plates the omelet for her and begins another for himself, each step drawing him closer to completing something and coming far too close to something else that he's not ready to deal with.

They've done this before, met on neutral ground, silent partners swaying to the canticle of discord until the notes become less strident, become a tune they can both step into even if they only step on each other's toes.

"Could you get the maple syrup?"

It's a reminder she's eating for two, letting her body's passenger dictate choices. That shows up again as she sips at the milk, but turns her nose up at her glass. "It's sour."

He tests the milk. "Tastes fine to me. Must be he has a taste for something else."

"He?"

He hasn't given much thought to the sex of the newest Booth, but he wouldn't mind a son. "There's even odds on having a boy."

It's the wrong thing to say.

Her large eyes are unblinking reminders of how wrong things have gone between them. "Have you talked to your sponsor?"

He confirms for her, tells her he's meeting the man for lunch, that he found a meeting for that evening. He's careful to ease the tension, to show her he's going to work the program, to repair the damage.

But she looks at him in the same way she looks at Max, uncertain where the truth lies and he feels the aches in his chest as he turns away from her to reach for the pan on the stove.

There's far too much to say between them, so they speak in silence as they eat.


	12. Ghosts

**Ghosts**

"I fucked up."

He sketches his descent into madness, the heady rush of winning replaced by heated attempts to recapture the magic. He ends his narrative and looks up from his hands into the face of his sponsor.

Cal takes more than a moment before he starts.

"Did you fuck up because you lost or because you got caught or because you started gambling in the first place?"

Cal's not pulling any punches.

"What do you think?"

"You need to say it out loud, Seeley." Cal reaches out for his coffee mug, the two missing fingers on his right hand turning the motion into a two-handed operation.

He says it out loud, takes the first step in a path of twelve steps, but he feels a long way from coming out of this.

"She's paying off your debts?"

Cal's eyes bore into him and he nods.

"How does that make you feel?"

Because this is Cal, it is not really a question; it's a mini-meeting. He tries to explain, tries to run through his inventory, but Cal interrupts him with a simple commentary.

"Bullshit."

He starts again, but by Cal's second expletive, he's drowning his thoughts with coffee and staring at the place where Cal is missing two little fingers.

"It's coming from here," Cal says, fingers pointing toward his head, "not there." He's pointing at a much lower spot and Booth feels the heat in his face. Cal knocks once on the table top, an old habit from his gambling days.

"I hate it."

"Do you want to gamble, Seeley?"

A wave of shame for being so out of control hits him, but he can't fool himself anymore if he tells the truth. He nods. "Yeah. I do."

"So, what's the plan, Seeley? What do you want to do?"

Cal's a long-time 12-stepper, lost one wife, three kids and two fingers to his addiction, but knows he can't bully someone into changing; he's told him that countless number of times.

"I think I've lost her." He sees Bones driving off to somewhere without him and it scares the shit out of him. He fears walking into an empty house, an emptier life. "Her respect. I think I've lost that."

That's the realization he made after late-night omelets as he turned toward the room he's sleeping in now, their bedroom door closing softly behind Bones. That click of the door hurt more than all the punches he took, all the money he lost, all the crap Aubrey was saying to him as he stuffed him into his car the night before after rescuing him from Dahlgren. A simply click, as muffled as it was, told him so much about where they were, how they were, what they were going to be.

"If I could tear this damned thing out of me, I would."

"Like you would have torn it out of your father?"

Cal's voice is soft, almost soothing, yet he can't help but look up at the man and see his face is hard. He's going to push the truth out of him.

"He was a drunk."

"And you're a gambler." Cal's not letting up. "Addiction is addiction is addiction, Seeley."

He knows this, but comparing himself to his father. . . . There are things he hates. He saw what his father did to his wife and sons and he feels his own life spinning out of control. His father drove away everyone in his life.

How far has he driven Bones?

"It's your choice, Seeley. Are you going to surrender to your Higher Power, Seeley, or are you going to surrender to gambling?"

Images somersault in his mind and he tries to sort them out. He's never walked away from a case, but he might just have to walk from this one or lose his life when Bones walks away from him. Cal's knuckles touch the tabletop again and he suddenly sees the picture clear.

"Damn it, Cal. I am do blind. I really fucked this up."

oOo

"How are you, Sweetie?"

She's only moments back in the lab from her appointment when Angela appears at her doorway, the question answered automatically by the pronouncement from her doctor that both she and the baby appear to be healthy.

"That's good, but no, Sweetie," Angela says in that slow deliberate way that indicates she means something else entirely, "I mean how are you with the Booth situation?"

She'd much rather talk about how cultural relativism impacts the study of forensic anthropology or the replacement of diachronic modes of study with synchronic, but this is Angela, her best friend, a woman who has helped her navigate a romantic relationship filled with nuances she doesn't always fully understand, and she is far too tired to verbally spar with her.

So while it is not rational, telling Angela about the money that Booth has lost somehow makes it more real.

"Oh, my God, Brennan."

She's had the better part of 14 hours to comprehend what has happened and deal with those consequences within her control. Her accountant has already managed to secure the funds to repay Booth's loan shark and bookie and she has taken charge of Booth's credit cards. With a few more words, she outlines her ultimatum to Booth and feels utterly exhausted by the effort.

Angela's eyes seem larger than normal and she notices the physical changes that indicate surprise and concern. "Are you all right financially?"

"Yes."

Angela's face muscles have tensed and she feels her own control slipping as her eyes burn with tears. She wants desperately to do something, anything, but break apart under these shards of pain.

"Booth is an addict," she says swiping at her eyes. For the last few weeks, she has educated herself on the meaning of that term as well as the short-term and long-term prognosis for the man she loves. "He needs to eschew gambling."

Nothing in the literature she has read suggests that this will be easy, but she knows that Booth has shown a remarkable strength of will at various times in his life.

"He says he is meeting his sponsor, but Aubrey says that addicts lie."

As a scientist, she craves proof, and the Booth that she has shared a house with these past three weeks has proven to be evasive and enigmatic; in many ways, he is more like her father than the man she married.

"Honey," Angela says as she takes a step closer, "are you considering divorce?"

She is considering everything and nothing as her best friend wraps her in her arms and her own tears provide the answer.


	13. Once More into the Fray

**Once More into the Fray**

He's shaved and showered and stands at Aubrey's desk waiting as the rest of the bullpen goes about their business, each agent studiously avoiding his gaze. The notes on the desk reveal hints of where Aubrey's been on this case, and he can't help but take in the scribbles on the margins of the man's calendar, leaf through the case file, decipher the scribbles between the crumbs that might just have been the man's lunch.

And he waits.

He's already updated himself on Special Agent Neidermeyer's investigation and recommended a revision to the Rizzo case and been updated by Agent Hickman on the surveillance of Senator Brickhouse's aide. Each step back into routine is meant to take him farther away from the urges within, but he's fighting for each inch, one inch at a time.

"Agent Booth?"

He tells Aubrey they need to talk in his office and Aubrey follows and doesn't seem surprised when Booth closes the door.

"I know who killed Ryder."

He explains the signals he's seen from the poker players, the seemingly random raps on the table, the nervous drumming of fingers.

"They've been signaling each other; they've been cheating." He's trying to build his case, but he knows it's a longshot—almost as hard as drawing to a royal flush. "Ryder caught them and called them on it. And they killed him to keep him quiet."

Aubrey's got financials on all the players, but that doesn't tell them much more than every one of them has won big and lost just as big over the last few months. Even Dahlgren, Phillips and MacKenzie.

"I'll go arrest them."

"With what?"

If his hunch were enough he'd have done it himself. "My guess is that Phillips and MacKenzie are cheating and Dahlgren's benefiting from it by simply finding the guy at the table who needs some extra scratch. He makes out like a bandit by keeping quiet. But Ryder figured it out, confronted Phillips or MacKenzie and was immobilized before they beat him to death."

Aubrey's eyes take on a squinty quality that spells resistance. "So that's how it is? Your next big gamble."

"I need you as back up. I go in there and play a few hands, catch them at it and confront them outside of the. . . ."

He's building his case, but Aubrey's not buying any of it. "Back in there?" He's livid. "You really are totally insane. You're willing to throw away everything you have for the next little buzz this gets you." The man turns to leave then turns back just as quickly. "You have the American dream, you know. Great wife, a cool kid, another on the way and a dream job and you're willing to throw that all away on whatever thrill this gets you."

"You give me the Bureau's stake. I'm going to pull out when I find an opening. . . ."

"Pull out?" Aubrey's agitation mirrors his own inside. "You can't even say all this without getting that glazed look in your eyes."

"Phillips and MacKenzie are working together. One of them wins late in the game when the other is dealing. It's in how they deal, or how they. . . ."

"She should leave you." Aubrey's taking a step into his own personal hell and Booth doesn't feel he has the strength to pull back. "She should take your kid and get as far the hell away from you before you drown her in this shit."

There's a voice in his head telling him he's doing this for Bones, to keep Bones, to protect Bones, but he's so off balance that he's not sure who he's protecting her from. He starts again.

"Listen to me." He's been put in far more dangerous situations, but for some reason he can't think of any of them right now; he just knows he can make things right if he can get back into the game. "We can't accuse them inside because all that will happen is they'll get photographed and banned and they don't want that. _We_ don't want that. Ryder got them outside and accused them and they killed him to keep him quiet."

"Then just stand outside the place and accuse them there, Agent Booth." Aubrey isn't backing down as his voice rises. "You got them figured out, so just confront them outside, when they leave. Tonight, we go back there and you confront them. Tell them what you saw. Get in their faces. Let them know that you'll ruin them. That should be enough for them to react."

It hits him suddenly—he's so deeply entrenched that he can only see one avenue headlong into land mines and the realization deflates him as he sinks down on the edge of his desk.

"Definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results." Aubrey's voice is softer. "If you go inside, you won't be able to stop. Look at you. You want to do something that's pure suicide to any hope of getting straight. You walk back in there and you lose everything, Agent Booth. Everything. Your career, your home, your family."

"On this, trust me. We do this my way."

oOo

The tearful storm ends just as quickly as it started and she blames it on far too many pregnancy hormones and far too little sleep. She pulls herself from Angela's embrace and begins to run through the bones in the body if only to calm herself further.

"Bren?"

She lists all the safeguards they've put in place for Christine—financial protections and insurance to see her through until the trust kicks in and what other provisions they've made in the event of their deaths. If Sweets were here, he would say that she is avoiding the question, but she is still too close to the brink of breaking apart again that it is all she can do.

"I know all that, Brennan; you've told me all this before." Angela's voice is warm and soft. "How far are you willing to go, Sweetie?"

For someone who has tried to control her life, she has learned that living with another person—_two other persons_—changes that control. She has had to make allowances for other's needs since moving in with Booth and having Christine. "I have a daughter I have to protect." Her hand goes to her belly; she takes comfort in knowing she has been a good mother. "And another child on the way, Angela."

"I have to do everything to protect them."


	14. Baby Steps

**Baby Steps**

He's here because he's promised, but he hates that he can't be _there_—where the light's better, where it there's no lingering smell of disinfectant, where there's that magical feeling of holding three of a kind on the way to a full house.

Where he can put down a bet and feel something more than the self-hatred that's coursing through him right now.

But all it takes is a good, long look at that picture well-creased from his wallet, the one Bones gave him—his two girls—and he knows that if he can't do it for himself right now, he's got to do it for them. To keep them.

_For them. For them. For them. For them. For. . . ._

He listens to the names as introductions ring the circle until it comes to him and he hesitates, the flight in his flight or fight reflex damn-near kicking in and he opens up his mouth just barely to get out the anchoring words that hold him to this spot for the next forty minutes: "I'm Seeley and I'm addicted to gambling."

oOo

Working the program means working the steps and he knows he's wavering so much he's like a flag on a windy day. So when the leader—_Gerald was it?—_asks him if he wants to say something—_there's only 7 people in the fellowship tonight_—he wants to wave him off, but that damned wind blows back his way and he opens up his mouth and stuff just pours out: "I'm pretty shaky right now. . . ."

oOo

He grabs a cup of muddy water in a Styrofoam cup and notices a few bills stuffed into another cup and wonders if it's enough to get him back into a game when the woman comes up behind him and asks him if he wants to go get some of the real stuff with the others at a coffee shop down the street and he's almost glad Aubrey's waiting on him because he's thinking of charming this woman out of some cash so he can walk inside to the game and take on Phillips and MacKenzie and show the world that he has some control and. . . .

"No," he says, the coffee sloshing over the rim as he sets it down on the table. "I've got to be someplace." But his legs don't quite move and he stands there listening to this woman whose own story that night was just as dark as the color of her eyes.

oOo

Once he carried a boy miles through a forest, miles as his shoulders burned and his legs felt like rubber and he barred any idea of laying down and letting the animals find them or the men kill them or just dropping the boy and finding his own way out. He carried the boy for miles as the boy's voice grew fainter and his own resolve had put him in a race with the blood dripping from Parker's wounds, the endpoint always over the next ridge, always past the next bend.

He's in that race again.

This time, he's sitting outside the place where he's been inside for the past few weeks, the place where he spiraled deeper and deeper into his addiction, spiraled deeper and deeper out of control as his thoughts spun around and around until he was sure he was in control when he was in the midst of losing everything.

And despite everything, he's fighting back the urge to just let it take him when he there's a knock on the car's window.

For just a moment he hesitates before rolling down the window.

"Didn't know if you had any dinner yet, so I brought you some Thai food because your wife said that's your favorite on stakeouts. Plus the large, economy size Thermos of coffee from the diner to keep you alert."

Aubrey's doing his best to be annoying and helpful, he doesn't know which, but he takes the food, his stomach welcoming the intrusion. "Told them it was for you and they threw in some extra dumplings and some of that vegetable tempura."

The man's hesitating outside the vehicle and while Booth would much rather be alone to do battle with his own demons, he cocks his head as a silent invitation and Aubrey scrambles to the passenger side.

The demons don't retreat because someone else is here. "Your wife also said that you like to talk while you're on stakeout."

He's opening a carton when he corrects Aubrey. "I like talking to Bones while I'm on stakeout."

"Yeah, well," Aubrey says, eyeing the food in Booth's hands, "she's not here."

He hands over the extras—certainly meant for Bones—and listens as the eating machine starts crunching on the tempura before making almost obscene sounds around the dumplings.

The night is cool and clear and he figures they've got an hour or so to kill before the first of the gamblers inside pack it up for the evening.

". . . And I just thought that was what they call in the program, 'stinkin' thinkin'' and I couldn't allow you to. . . ."

He lets Aubrey rattle on with periodic pauses as the man sucks down something else from the collection of cartons. In his own mind he's repeating the stories of the evening, the lost fortunes and the lost souls interwoven with the voices in his head that are warring with a sense of duty and a sense of daring, a streak of honor battling a streak of luck waiting to start with the next hand, when Aubrey nudges him.

"Is that. . .?"

"No." Stooped shoulders and a backward glance only indicate the first loser of the evening, not their prey. The man takes off east into the night.

"You think it's the woman who enticed Ryder, put him at ease and then Phillips cracks him over the skull?"

It's positing a scenario, a game he still likes to play with Bones, but now he's thinking of other games. He practically offers to bet Aubrey on his scenario, but fights back the urge. "Does it matter?"

A mouthful of food doesn't stop the man from making a comment. "I'd think it matters a great deal." He pauses long enough to swallow. "A guy like Ryder, ex-military, he'd probably be put at ease with a woman. Maybe she cries, puts on an act and then, wham, Phillips pops him on the head, they tie him up and pop him in the trunk until they can dump his body, but he wakes up, bim, bam and then. . . ."

Between mouthfuls—and sometimes not—Aubrey paints a portrait of the last few moments of Ryder's life and he should be listening, but he's not. He's dissecting the Serenity Prayer, word-for-word, trying to rekindle the inner peace that has deserted him. Maybe that he's deserted.

Aubrey's crackling something in front of him. "Gummy bears?" He begins to tear into the package. "It's not the best dessert for Thai, but in a pinch, it'll do. You seem to be the kind of guy who would like the red ones."

"You should go."

The younger agent has done his duty, fed him and made sure he didn't go inside, but as good as Aubrey can be, he has no idea the war zone going on inside the ex-Ranger's head. Booth checks his watch as a way to sell the suggestion. "You should go. They could come out at any time."

"Yeah, yeah," Aubrey agrees as he starts to gather the empty containers. "You know your wife's worried about you?"

"Why are you talking to my wife?"

Aubrey's arms are full as he backs out of the car. "Someone's got to, Agent Booth. Someone has to."

oOo

He should talk to her, should tell her a few things, but as he tries to compose texts to his wife he finds it hard to say anything. He writes that he misses her on the stakeout, writes that he's gone to a meeting, talked to his sponsor. He asks her to forgive him, asks her to kiss Christine goodnight. He writes that he loves her.

And he erases all of them.

He stares at the entryway to the poker palace, the place where he started back down the road to an obsession that's so damned hard to kick and he wonders if he'll ever make things right again. The human body has 206 bones and his Bones has at least half that many emotions and moods that he's dealt with over the years.

Yet he doesn't know how to talk to a disappointed Bones.

oOo

As tedious as the waiting is, it ends almost too quickly—Phillips (he could have bet that it would have been MacKenzie) first takes offense at his accusations of cheating before MacKenzie emerges from the shadows and levels a gun at him.

He has a healthy respect for guns.

The plan calls for Aubrey to wait in the shadows, wait for an opening, and as Phillips and MacKenzie herd him to their car, he's wondering if the younger man understands the urgency of the situation when he sees a third player slipping from the darkness: Dahlgren.

And he has a gun to Aubrey's head.

oOo

**Author's Note: **First, thank you to everyone who has reviewed or favorited or followed or just read this story. I appreciate the comments and the encouragement.

Second, please read some other fine writing from the likes of **razztaztic **whose _Roots and Wings _is a welcome respite from the angst of this story, but who also offers up a boatload of angst in Almost Forever; or **FaithinBones** who is probably the most prolific of writers and can be counted upon for a story or two daily; or **CovalentBond **who writes with a richness of language that I can only hope to emulate one day.

Third, if I disappear for a bit here, it's because my computer needs to be repaired, and my job is one of those deals that demands 48 hours of my life crammed into 24 hours.


	15. Under Fire

**Under the Gun**

_As tedious as the waiting is, it ends almost too quickly—Phillips (he could have bet that it would have been MacKenzie) first takes offense at his accusations of cheating before MacKenzie emerges from the shadows and levels a gun at him._

_He has a healthy respect for guns._

_The plan calls for Aubrey to wait in the shadows, wait for an opening, and as Phillips and MacKenzie herd him to their car, he's wondering if the younger man understands the urgency of the situation when he sees a third player slipping from the darkness: Dahlgren._

_And he has a gun to Aubrey's head._

oOo

He should have expected this from cheaters and says so, the bravado as false as it can be, but he puts a good face on it.

It's just another gamble in a series of bad gambles that have already strained his marriage, threatened his career, and has now put the two of them at risk; he has to think fast before he adds Aubrey's life and his to the mounting losses.

There's time as they're herded past the cars and toward the next block, to a deserted canyon of warehouses. There's little light here and no witnesses to this intended death march. A few glances toward Aubrey tell him the junior agent's already paid the price for being caught watching—a small cut surrounded by a growing bruise above his left eye.

"Is this where you took Ryder?" It's only a guess, but he's trying to work out the puzzle while buying them some leverage. "He wouldn't buy in so you brought him here. Couldn't see squeezing others dry."

But MacKenzie doesn't see it for the bluff it is. "You've got all the answers." MacKenzie has a steady hand with the gun, her fine features losing detail in the shadows making her look chiseled from stone. "Why don't you tell us where we went wrong?"

He's already poked the hornet's nest, but he's not about to make anything else easy for them. His defiance makes MacKenzie's face go even harder.

"Fucking bastard knows shit," Phillips says. "We got sloppy."

"No. This one's an easy mark," MacKenzie counters as she waves him on with her gun. "You could tell by just how deep he got in with Dahlgren. He's got the gene. All we had to do was play him."

"Now he thinks he can play us."

There's more than just a sting of truth in her remark, but when he tries to shake it off, it only echoes in his head. Aubrey's looking at him, looking for a sign of what they're going to do next, since this is far off the game plan they had.

He gambles again.

"Is this how it started with Ryder?" The shadowy light reveals more than just a Aubrey's injury; he's angry Dahlgren made him. "You couldn't pay him off so you killed him."

A lone streetlamp holds back the night and in its light he sees a small hesitation in Dahlgren. He's sat so long across the table from the man, he's sure he's read him right. "You didn't know?" He leans closer to the man. "Ryder caught them cheating. When she couldn't seduce him into silence, Phillips killed him."

Phillips orders him to stop, but he ignores him. He describes Ryder's death with as much squinty detail as he remembers from the reports, watching the man's face as the details grow. "He tells Sal inside and you're out of business. No more big paydays. Banned from poker up and down the coast."

Dahlgren's face has gone slack and he's eyeing MacKenzie and Phillips.

"You kill me, you don't see your money. A loan shark might nibble a bit, draw blood, but killing someone? That's not your style. You can't get anything from a dead man."

He's going in hard, betting everything, hoping that Dahlgren can factor out the other two even as Phillips is telling him to shut up and MacKenzie's finger seems to pulsate on the trigger.

"This isn't something you want to be a part of." He looks Dahlgren square in the face. "It's time to fold."

Dahlgren's stewing over his words, stewing over the money he's owed and Phillips shoves him into the wall and orders him to "shut the fuck up." His cheek scrapes the brick, but it's Dahlgren's reaction that counts.

"You lose a little now," MacKenzie's stone cold calm as she addresses Dahlgren, "but we still have some cards to play." She's playing a far different game than the one she played at the table, betting everything from a position of strength. "You don't want to lose everything."

"And them?"

MacKenzie supplies the answer that reveals nothing and everything at the same time. "You don't really want to know."

Dahlgren holds his position although he looks like he'd love to run.

"We know Ryder was killed in one of these warehouses." Aubrey's helping to ratchet up the tension. "Then he was folded up like one of those origami cranes and stuffed him in a trunk. There's got to be some blood in that trunk."

"Whose car did you use?"

"Phillips, just shut him up." MacKenzie's voice drips violence.

Dahlgren has dropped the barrel of the gun so it's pointing at Aubrey's gut. He looks like he's deciding his play.

"End this now." He's fighting alongside Aubrey and for Aubrey and himself, to have a life after all this. If it comes to it, he'll use more than just words if it gives Aubrey a chance. "They're willing to kill, but are you? That's the only way they're going to keep us quiet." Dahlgren looks torn when MacKenzie warns him to shut up as Phillips throws a fist toward his head to silence him.

The fist is iron and snaps his head backward. Then another connects. He doesn't know if it's the blows or the fear or something else, but the night suddenly explodes around them as a vehicle screeches around the corner, high beams catching them all in its fiery glare. They're frozen in the light, but somehow the woman recovers first and turns her killer's instincts toward the car, firing into the light.

He throws his shoulder into Phillips and powers upward, slamming the man into the brick wall behind them. The force sends Phillips' head thudding backward, stunning him. His fist finds a soft spot, then another and he finally connects with the man's ribs and hears a gasp, then delivers another blow.

Whatever he's been pummeling is sliding down the bricks and crumpling onto the broken sidewalk.

MacKenzie? The light is still like soap in his eyes and he can't see well enough to find her. He yells toward the car to kill the lights, yells for Aubrey, yells for MacKenzie. With an ex-Ranger's instincts, he's counted shots, but he doesn't trust if he's right and when the lights go out finally, he blinks hard, trying to lose the shards of light that still linger.

He calls again for Aubrey, who answers this time.

"Is Dahlgren down?"

He rubs his eyes as Aubrey affirms he's got his man contained then stumbles toward the car. His vision's still wracked by spots and strains of colors that come and go with each blink, but as he nears the vehicle he can just make out that MacKenzie's fire caught the windshield, shattered it, and the driver's head is forward, against the steering wheel.

And all the while, his gut is screaming at him.

He's still blinking away the bleaching effects of the light, still stumbling forward when he finally hits the door and swings it open.

And has Bones slump sideways into his arms.


	16. Waiting

**Waiting**

He's curled in the waiting room chair like a question mark, uncertain of the outcome seemingly a mile or more down the hallway where Bones has disappeared with a nurse. He's wrapped in worry that she's seriously injured, that the baby's hurt.

But it's more than just her blood or concern he's wallowing in.

He's been seesawing between fear and hope, uncertainty and anxiety. A few times he tries to pray, but the words don't come easily. If he closes his eyes, he sees Bones taking fire, taking the heat that should have been his. If he lets his mind stray for a moment, he can see the head slumped on the dash, feel her weight as she slips from the seat into his arms.

For a moment he holds off the images and manages a simple request when his prayer is interrupted.

"Mr. Booth?"

A nurse appears as if by magic and he silently thanks God. He's even more grateful when she leads him down the hallway to an examination room.

"Your wife insisted you be in the room for the ultrasound."

He's ushered into the curtained area where Bones lays, her rounded belly slick with goo. Her hand reaches out for his and he completes the connection.

Here, he's ramrod straight like an exclamation point, aware of everything and understanding nothing. They've wiped away the blood from the wound on her temple, but a few dots of rusty brown remain on her blouse that's scrunched up as the doctor holds the wand over her belly.

"The doctor is going to check for a placenta abruption," Bones explains. He has no idea what an abruption is, but he can guess.

She's wearing few battle wounds from the encounter with MacKenzie— a few cuts along her arm earned when the windshield exploded around her. While she insisted she was fine, he had insisted on seeing a doctor, on making sure both she and the baby were really fine.

There's a part of him that would like to let her know just how scared he was when she fell into his arms. There's another part of him that would like to shake some sense into her.

And there's a part of him that wants to thank her for saving his and Aubrey's life.

"All right, Temperance, let's see how the little guy is doing."

The doctor is far too calm and studied for his taste, far too slow in confirming what he needs to know.

The show begins, the triangular slice of life exposed on the screen in shades of gray and white. It's something like an old snow-covered TV show with only one actor, but he can immediately recognize the outline of his son.

"Mr. Booth?"

He's craning his neck trying to make sense of the scramble of lights.

"Booth?" The nurse is eyeing him over her glasses but it is Bones who makes the invitation. "You _can_ come closer."

He follows his wife's suggestion, creeping closer to the screen until he can make out his child's scrunched up face, his tiny hands opening and closing to a rhythm only he can hear.

"He's okay?"

The doctor supplies a mumbo jumbo assortment of medical terms, but Bones supplies the only answer he needs to hear.

"Yes."

"And Bones?"

The hesitation has him holding his breath. The area surrounding the V-shaped laceration above her right eye where the rear view mirror struck her has already turned purple.

"She needs to take it easy. Acetaminophen for pain, a warm compress. . . ."

He listens carefully to the instructions, repeating them to himself as the doctor winds down.

"She's okay?" He cannot believe she even survived the onslaught. "They're both okay?"

The doctor repeats the confirmation, but within seconds she offers up some more advice to Bones. "And if anything feels wrong, I want you to contact your doctor immediately."

He nods stiffly. Bones' hand is still glued to his as the nurse wipes away the gel and together they help her sit up.

He catches sight of a small bruise high on her ribs, the imprint of something in the vehicle that tangled with her sense of self-preservation and he feels a wave of guilt as he knows that he didn't take enough precautions, that he didn't secure enough back-up.

For some reason he's reminded of Sweets and how the man bled out in front of him, and he asks the doctor again if Bones is really okay.

"No," the doctor says, agreeing with his worst fears. "You ever think you might want a different . . . ." But the woman stops short and finishes her thought a different way.

"Physically, she and the baby are healthy as far as I can tell."

oOo

She's aching for sleep by the time they're home and she half expects Booth to peel off to the room he's made his own, but instead he follows her into their bedroom and stands awkwardly near the doorway as she considers running a bath or simply crawling into bed. She opts for sitting on the edge of the bed, her tiredness winning out over any pain.

"It was a big gamble, Bones."

Aubrey's already admitted as much and she reviews the events of the evening. ". . . But you needed to confront Phillips and. . . ."

"That's not what I meant, Bones." He's rooted at the door just as she's rooted to the bed. But she's far too tired and sore for riddles.

"Hodgins helped me narrow down the location of the warehouse where Ryder was killed." She closes her eyes, the relief in doing so makes her decide to simply lay down and let sleep take her. Kicking off her shoes, she tests the bruise on her temple. "The vehicle provided adequate cover and confusion to enable you and Aubrey to ex. . . ."

"You know what I mean, Bones."

It's the edge in his voice that brings her back to consciousness and she blinks. Her hand reflexively goes to her belly and she feels the movement of the child within. He's still standing at the door, still in a kind of limbo, and she can clearly see the bruising on his face from his fight with Phillips. But she cannot see his point and she says so.

"I called the FBI for back-up, Booth." She explains how she'd woken Hodgins and brought him back to the lab to examine particulates, but Booth's expression indicates that he's not satisfied with her answer. "I did the calculations," she tries. "They would not have gotten there in time."

By now, her tiredness has given way to a simmering anger and she points out the way in which gambling has affected them, their family, their relationship. Her tone is even, but with an edge to match his own.

"I did what I did to help, Booth," she finishes. "I didn't gamble with our family."

In terms of storms that have raged between them or around them over the years, this is a mere microburst, but it is enough. Booth says nothing, but stands at the doorway a moment longer before he retreats to his part of the house and leaves her alone in their bedroom.

Despite her exhaustion, it takes her several hours before sleep overtakes her.


	17. Magical Thinking

**Magical Thinking**

He wakes to feeling heavy and clumsy, the late night making the whole morning feel like he's walking through sludge. He drags himself to the shower and tries to wash away the tiredness, but even a long stay under the spray does little good. In the kitchen Bones isn't doing much better, the pregnancy already slowing her down, but last night's words, the dismissal to _his room_ remain in the air between them.

They barely talk.

The trip into the Hoover is spent in strained silence as is the trip up the elevator. If not for Aubrey and Caroline whom they meet along the way, the entire sum of words in their conversation could have been totaled on one of their hands.

But he doesn't care.

Then it's watching Aubrey try to break down Dahlgren's story. Caroline adds her own soundtrack, a series of grunts and sighs that mark their progress—or lack thereof.

Dahlgren asserts he was only trying to keep Aubrey from stopping his attempt to collect on the money he's lent Booth and the man refuses to move off that square.

"You think he's in deeper, cher?"

"Yeah," he says a bit too quickly. Bones doesn't react, simply stares forward at Dahlgren. "It's a perfect set-up. They cheat to turn a player's pockets inside out and Dahlgren comes along and helps fill them up only so he can lose again."

It only takes a glance at Bones to tell that she doesn't buy that as the whole story, but she remains silent.

"Oh, we can get him on conspiracy and all those other charges for aiding and whatnot, but you haven't tied him to Ryder's death, cher. In fact, he can plead out that he just joined the other two's circus train and only just found out about their murderous ways." She's spelled out all they've got.

"All he needs is a damned lawyer to help him make that story stick." Caroline's tone offers up a challenge. "You are way off your game here, cher."

"I wouldn't bet against us," but he's not sure if he believes his own words.

It's the right thing to say, but the wrong thing as well. They trigger something in Bones and she is out the door of the observation room without saying anything.

And somehow her departure says so much.

oOo

She's in the elevator and halfway down when she remembers her car is now part of the evidence in this case and she pulls out her phone to call a cab.

It's the first time she's felt in control that morning.

Talking to this Booth requires a skill set she is unfamiliar with and not for the first time does she wish she could talk to Sweets if only to gain his insights into addictive behaviors even if his is a pseudoscience.

But there is no Sweets, nor any within his profession that would know Booth as well or who she would trust as much as him.

"This must be some form of magical thinking."

She's read every scholarly book she can on addiction since this has started and she finds herself tilting toward psychology.

As she waits on the taxi, she puts it all on the pregnancy hormones and the lack of sleep and throws in her injuries for good measure. But the thought that has haunted her of late creeps into her conscious thought: Booth has found something he loves more than herself and Christine and Parker.

Tears threaten on that thought but she's rescued by the arrival of the cab. She shifts back to the case, back to the evidence that explains how Ryder died and she instantly knows one thing they have yet to do.

In one short phone call, she says more to Booth than she has all morning.

oOo

He's supervised a hundred crime scenes over the years and he can almost predict what the dancing blue lights will find on the warehouse floor.

"Blood."

Under the lights it shows up in spatters and smears, and he watches as the FBI techs bend down to scrape and blot and do all the things they do to gather it up to later prove who it belongs to. In his mind he places a bet on the blond tech to be the first to finish his sample, a quick blot and then into the plastic bag and he's the winner when Cam interrupts his game.

"Do we even know who owns this warehouse?"

He's got forensic accountants looking into the labyrinth of holding companies and shell businesses involved, but he makes another mental bet for Dahlgren holding the paper.

"Kittering Holdings," he says. "But that's only the first name on the paper trail. It'll end up being Dahlgren."

It's a guess, but a practiced one, and he's willing to bet big on the outcome. He's feeling a new sense of control, a sense of holding all the right cards as the fingerprints alone put MacKenzie and Phillips here and the techs are pulling in fibers and hair samples that he knows will match the murderous pair. It's only a hair or a fingerprint away from Dahlgren, but he wants it all.

"This has the makings of being a big win for someone." Hodgins is carrying a box full of detritus that is already marked and ready for the lab. "Lots of people probably owed Dahlgren insane amounts of money and with him in jail, he won't be able to collect. Pretty nifty deal for the gamblers. Addicts 1, Dahlgren zero because he's going down."

_He's_ one of those people, but he can't really point to the bugman's words as the reason why a vein of anger burbles to the surface.

"They cheated," he says. The next words come out as a growl. "They kept wringing out more money from players who couldn't afford to lose and Dahlgren supplied high octane fuel for the fire with a vig to match." He's just getting started when he sees Cam and Hodgins staring at him. It stops him.

"Just find me something on this guy."

oOo

She spends part of the morning with Christine and another part avoiding Angela.

But there are few places to hide from the artist.

"You staked out the warehouse and confronted three armed gunmen?" Angela crowds the doorway of the Bone room. "Booth had Aubrey out there." Her finger points toward her swollen belly. "You took junior as back-up?"

She clarifies what happened, her re-telling of the events as unadorned and precise as any of her forensic reports.

"You went to the hospital?"

She nods.

"And you're both fine?"

Another nod. This time Angela strides forward to embrace her and she keeps her gloved hands up to keep from contaminating them. As she lets her go, Angela provides the reason behind Booth's silence that morning. "I'll still bet that Booth is pissed you did that," she says before adding, "although it saved his life and Aubrey's."

"And things between you and Booth are better."

She doesn't have to answer that question before Angela has her wrapped up in her arms again.

"He loves you, Brennan," she offers. "He's just in too deep to see the truth."

And this time, she lets her friend comfort her.


	18. Odd Man Out

**Odd Man Out**

He's not a vengeful man, but there's something about Dahlgren's entrance that makes him want to finish off the bastard if only to wipe the smirk off his face. The man strides into the room with a head full of arrogance and drags the heavy chair across the floor, something akin to fingernails on a blackboard.

If he can't slap the man, he'd at least like to slap the cuffs on him.

Problem is he's behind glass, eight feet away in the observation room, the honor of bringing down Dahlgren left to Aubrey and Bones. It doesn't matter that he led the investigation; he's a liability.

Caroline's here and he didn't blink when she told him she'd been ordered to observe. Years as an Army Ranger and as an FBI agent honed his instincts as had being the punching bag for his father's tirades. He's straddling the edge of a knife on this one and he knew it the moment the ADA strode into his office. He might have arrested the bad guys but he can't be the one to close the case.

"Cher, you know how much I like your moves," Caroline had told him in his office, "but I think it best if you leave it to your team. Let your partners do the dance with this man."

So he's the odd man out, the "guest" to his own party. It's hard not being in the room facing down Dahlgren, but it might be harder facing his wife. There's more than a glass window between them, but whatever it is, is far more fragile than the glass and he's wondering if his mistake will take them down as well.

"We've arrested Phillips and McKenzie for the murder of Mr. Ryder." Aubrey's voice is a touch sardonic as he settles into his seat. "Both of them have lawyered up. So we need some additional information from you."

"I usually try to see all the angles, but I never saw your friend as a Fed." The man looks like he's ready to do his own kind of two-step. "When you took his side, I began to suspect he wasn't a mild-mannered player." He punctuates his point by leaning in toward Aubrey. "Either he's a really fine actor or he's just an addict."

He knows what he is, but the description stings coming from Dahlgren.

"You could see it in the guy's eyes." Dahlgren grins. "Lit up like three cherries on a slot machine when he had his first winning hand."

"You've got this all figured out," Aubrey says taking the lead. "You did hold a gun on us. The way you were talking, it sounded as if you were in on their scheme."

Dahlgren's not moving to Aubrey's tune. "Look," he says, his hands spreading outward, "I was trying to protect my investment and didn't want to be jumped by the two of you." He even cracks a smile. "No judge is going to see me as anything other than a footnote to this story. A man who got caught up in something more heinous than trying to make sure he wasn't robbed while he was trying to collect on a debt. You're looking at a murder and all I did was try to prevent my own." He leans back. "I went quietly, didn't I? When that car showed up with the brights on? Thought you'd brought the big guns and I sure as hell didn't want to be uncooperative."

It's a fool's bet, but Dahlgren's making it and the fact that he's here without a lawyer either makes him supremely confident or supremely dumb.

"Tell me the squint squad found something that does more than puts a hitch in his foxtrot," Caroline mutters.

He nods. Even without knowing what Bones and the squints have found, he also wants this dance to end badly for Dahlgren.

Aubrey has choreographed this interview. He outlines what happened, how the terrible two had tried to herd them into a warehouse space, how that had been foiled by the appearance of the car.

"Then all hell broke loose."

"The person who drove into there like the cavalry had some balls, I'd say." Dahlgren is enjoying this, certain he's going to skate.

"Thank you," Bones says, the compliment too good to pass up. "But technically I don't have balls, or more correctly, testicles."

Dahlgren's caught with his mouth open and it's Bones who does him the favor and shuts it for him.

"People with a gambling addiction often have flawed thinking about the odds of winning," Bones—who doesn't know how to be anything but direct—delivers the message for Dahlgren, but it somehow slashes him. "It involves your brain chemistry as well as learned and habitual behaviors. It is probably why you somehow think that you are helping your case by feigning your innocence, but you should know better. You should know how your addiction affects the people around you." She stares straight at the man. "You had a hand in killing Ryder." She waits for Aubrey to play his part and produce the evidence and be done with Dahlgren, but the words seem to hold him in place. She slides the evidence packet from his side of the table to hers and opens it up and presents it to Dahlgren.

There's only a glance spared for Aubrey as her finger marks a critical point. "This is an analysis of blood that was left behind in the warehouse. This is Ryder's blood and this," she looks up at Dahlgren, "is yours."

"We were able to cross check it against the blood that was drawn last night when you fell. It's a match to the blood in the warehouse."

Aubrey cuts in. "You must have hurt yourself when you killed Ryder."

The smirk is gone. Bones runs through the evidence like it's a dance card. Each particulate draws the circle tighter and tighter until Dahlgren's sitting grim and silent, his freedom running down to nothing.

But he's not applauding Dahlgren's arrest as Aubrey does the honors. He's not even listening much as the other agent lists the charges or when Bones excuses herself to go back to the lab.

He's only hearing one thing that dances around and around in his mind: "You should know better."

And he wonders if he really does.

oOo

The woman who locks down evidence while locking away distractions has no rational reason for what she does next. Once she locates her rental car in the parking garage, she takes off and drives. Well past the Jeffersonian, well past her obstetrician's office and the organic grocers nearby she barely notices the turn-off for the new Maryland address and steers the car past that to a different, equally familiar road.

It makes no sense, but she does it anyway.

A small twinge hits her as she turns into the street and she slows the car as she approaches the site of their old house. She pats her belly absentmindedly, soothing the fetus within as she pulls the rental into a spot across the street from where she once lived with Booth and Christine.

But the old barn with its gambrel roof and shady past is gone. The only remnant of their lives there are a few stray plantings that they had made to the property and the tree house Booth had built for Christine.

If she believed in such things as Booth does, she might believe there is something symbolic here. But she understands evolution, understands that change is inevitable. Still, the empty lot with the For Sale sign posted near the cherry tree they planted outside Christine's room is a stark reminder of a different time.

A few droplets of rain spatter her windshield. She had wrestled with the FBI then the insurance company on the old house and had given little thought of it once it had been sold. But being here is enough to unlock her memories and she knows that it is not the place that makes a home, but the people. Lightning quick she realizes what she wants in her relationship with Booth, what she wants for Christine and her unborn child.

The intensity of the rain grows and in one big deluge, the sign's features become washed out, distorted like a giant watercolor painting where the colors run then turn to gray. She waits for the rain to let up before changing gears and turning the car back toward the Jeffersonian.

oOo

He knows there's trouble the moment he walks into the Founding Fathers and finds Caroline at the back table with Aubrey. His latest partner has only one plate in front of him and he knows that they aren't there for the food.

He almost turns around.

But Caroline catches sight of him and waves him over and one thing he's learned over the years is to do what the prosecutor expects of him. Just as he slides into his seat, the intervention begins.

"Look, I know that you've had a pretty rough year. . . ," Aubrey begins.

Caroline raises her hand and he holds his breath. "I'm not going to sugar coat this, cher. You've created a little crime fighting machine and now you've thrown a wrench into its works and that's just got to stop."

"Do you hear what I am saying to you?"

oOo

He'd gotten two earfuls and then some from the ADA and Aubrey by the time he arrives at the house. He's grateful for the silence, grateful he doesn't have to explain where he's been and whom he's been with.

But his gut is screaming that there's something wrong in the silence.

A quick tour of the house spells out why the place is so quiet: neither Christine nor Brennan is home despite the hour. He's about to call his wife's cell when the front door opens.

He's reminded of the odd silences in his childhood home, the long awkward stares from his father, the tense wariness of his mother, yet this is a different time and place and Bones does not back down like his mother. She crosses to the kitchen table and drops her messenger bag there before he breaks the silence.

"Where's Christine?"

"She's spending the night with Angela and Hodgins."

He'd much rather ask her a dozen questions about the sleepover, but he knows better.

"Caroline sends her congratulations." He's having a hard time reading Bones. "She thinks you did a good job with Dahlgren and the others."

His wife stands at the table, her arms folded against the swell of her stomach. "_We_ did a good job," she corrects him. "But you should have let someone else go undercover."

How can he deny the truth? Yet he feels the urge to roll the dice on this one with a single admission. "I made a mistake."

"Just one?" She gives him that look, the one he calls the schoolmarm look, the one that makes him feel like he's back in 7th grade under the stern gaze of Miss Kowalski after getting caught looking at Belinda Caswell's math test. "You're an addict, Booth. You knew it could trigger your addiction, but you did it anyway."

"It was a mistake," he repeats. "I can't believe everyone's giving me grief about this and we solved the case."

Something changes between them, but he's not sure what. All he knows is that pleading his side isn't softening Bones or winning any ground.

"If it's about the money, Bones, I'll get it back."

"By what?" Her voice is almost mournful. "Gambling?"

The silence returns like a shroud.

"You said that marriage means that both people are working at creating a life together." She is pleading her case, but it's a case for all of them. "We are a family, but it hasn't felt like we've been one."

"And I can't live like this, Booth. I don't want our children to live like this."

He watches as she twists off the gold wedding band.

"What are you doing?" The band clinks against the tabletop. "Bones, look, it was a mistake. I made a mistake, that's all it was."

"You said that marriage is something that you have to work at." Her tone is soft, but each word seems like a blow to his heart. "I don't mind work, Booth. But to stay with you when you are gambling would be a gamble in itself. And I won't gamble on our children like that."

"I just won't."

oOo

Down the street is a pool hall beckoning him, but his finger runs along the coolness of the gold band in his packet and he shifts his direction toward a different doorway. Here the sign, hand-written and torn, points him downward to an out-of-the-way spot where the car noises outside disappear and all he hears are muffled voices behind a closed door.

It takes him a moment to find the courage, but he takes a deep breath and turns the knob.

The scene is a familiar one although the people are not. He's driven more than 40 miles to find this place tonight, to start a different kind of winning streak.

And possibly save his life.

He takes in the nods of greeting and makes his way to the coffee pot if only to give his hands something more to do than use Bones' ring as a worry stone.

He knows how this goes, but he still hangs back as everyone finds a seat. The chairs squeak and moan as they usually do at these places, but he doesn't hear it as he tries to rub the golden ring in his pocket for luck.

Because it's about all he had left.

It begins with a prayer because this is a church of a different sort, and he hangs on each word and repeats it as others provide the litany. He's repeating the prayer in his head for the hundredth time hoping the words will help him find the strength to go home to an empty house when someone taps his shoulder and asks him if he wants to say something.

He's afraid he might break apart.

But he stands and takes a deep breath, then another before clearing his throat.

"I'm Seeley," he says, his voice sounding strange and hollow.

A number of the voices welcome him by name.

"I'm Seeley," he repeats. He takes another breath and reminds himself that he does not want to be his father or his brother. He looks out at the circle of strangers and sees himself in them.

"I am Seeley," he says, "and I am a gambling addict."


	19. Losing Hand

**Losing hand**

Through the lab and a set of glass doors, turn right toward the green door. Take the stairs down almost three flights into the very depths of the Jeffersonian. It's cool stillness down here, surrounded by the earth on three sides and covered by the lab above. Here is a library of the dead, in volumes unnamed, waiting to be read just the same. Turn on the first light table nearest the computer. It's the oldest table there and the ballasts need to warm up before it reaches its full brightness. Until it does, until it climbs out of its own limbo, log into the computer and prioritize the results done by the grad students. Six, no, seven preliminary identifications. Ignore their reports.

She'd rather reach her own conclusions.

Her father would say that she was trying to solve the puzzle without looking at the photo on the box, but she knows better. The less she knows about the skeletal remains, the more she will have to engage with them. The less she will have to think about something beyond the task.

It's a walk toward the back of the stacks, back to No. 2175. Two boxes for No. 3320. Another two for No. 893. Back and forth she goes to collect the bone boxes.

She leaves the last set of boxes on the cart, slightly worn by the activity. Her left hand rests on the swell of her abdomen, the fetus resting within.

She feels the weight of having no ring on that finger.

Ignoring the sensation, she begins to unpack one of the drawers, the skull facing down the length of table where the skeleton will be pieced together. Each movement measured and precise as she lays out the rest of the skeleton, she stops only to make a preliminary examination, to feel the surface of the bones, to observe the imperfections, to read the story present there.

These bones, long forgotten, cry out to be heard and she ignores her own inner cries to cater to theirs.

It is the only way she can cope with what she has done.

oOo

He's lost a fortune tonight.

The shock still hasn't worn off, but he can still feel the urges pushing at him, propelling him forward through one town, then another. He doesn't have the advantage of the GPS in the SUV, just the instincts honed from years of traveling this area, so he points the car past Racine along Lisbon to a shortcut he knows to the address he's been given.

He's looking to win back what he's lost.

There's not much in his wallet and his credit card has already gotten a workout tonight, but he's got one thing that's valuable and he can trade on that.

He's got to.

A red light blinks on suddenly and he slams on his brakes, the car jerking to a stop as he berates himself for losing focus. He taps the steering wheel impatiently. _That's how it is, isn't it?_ he thinks. _You know exactly what you need to do to win it all back and there's a damned stoplight._

With the green light, he juices the gas pedal, pushes past the intersection, the urge to win back a lost fortune far too strong to stop him.

The streets winds through darkened neighborhoods, takes him to street where the neon lights don't know how late it is, past a Catholic Church with a steeple reaching up to the heavens to focus a light on the souls of all who pass.

It's a prayer he needs tonight, a prayer and some luck, something to counteract the streak of bad luck that's been running through his life. He's got no one to go home to, no one to back him up if he can't make this work.

He's on his own.

Somehow he passes up the place and has to duck down an alley and circle back. The parking lot is lit only by a stray security beacon stuck on the middle of the brick wall. He parks in the shadows and finds his way to the side door.

Down a flight. The air grows cooler, closer. He's clutching the only thing he's got of value, the only token that matters when he opens the door.

Only one or two people look toward him as he enters. He's waved in to the last opening at the table.

He feels Bones' ring in his pocket, fingers the way the metal on the inside of the ring seems smoother except for the small ridges there that remind him of the engraving. Resting his elbows at the table, he sizes up the others there, reading them like the lawman he is. The player he is.

It's a different kind of play here, a do-or-die game that can turn around fortunes if he only works hard enough. There are no wishes to be burned to spread out into the universe, no prayers made in the dead of night, no fingers crossed with a hope for some kind of miracle. There's only so many times you can lose a fortune before fate won't allow you to get it back. And great fortune isn't always measured in gold and silver.

So there's only one outcome here. His turn comes, and while he has a choice, he sees only one possibility. Clutching Bones' ring tightly in his right hand, he does the only thing he can do.

"I'm Seeley. And I'm addicted to gambling."


	20. Living the Lonely Life

**Living the lonely life**

Maybe it's the shock of what Bones did, maybe it's the guilt for what he's done, but he's working the steps with a vengeance. Countdown to 30 meetings in 30 days as prescribed by Gavin, his sponsor. Besides eating at the diner—he can't bring himself to stow anything more than some cheese and nitrate-laden luncheon meats in the fridge plus a 6-pack of beer at his extended-stay hermit's cell—and a quick fast-food bite wherever he can, the only time he's stepping out other than work in the last week is to be with the other 12-steppers.

But he doesn't know if it's enough.

"You talk to her yet?"

Gavin's not letting up; there's 18 years of sobriety staring back at him, challenging him. At least the man's found the one diner in Maryland that serves great corned beef on rye stacked high and slathered with a stone-ground mustard laced with maple syrup. But Gavin can't find a decent cup of coffee to save his soul.

"You could acid etch concrete with that stuff," he gasps after his first sip. He grabs the water to cut the bitterness before wrapping his hands around the sandwich that begs to be savored if only to mask the aftertaste of the coffee. "The guy I work with, Aubrey, he'd kill to know about this place. The guy's an eating machine. Just tell him to forget the coffee unless he wants to cut a hole in his stomach."

"You're avoiding, Seeley." The eyes don't let up. "You need to talk to her."

He wants to come back with a question: which _her_ is he talking about, but he knows better. "She knows I'm going to meetings," is about all he'll admit. Whether it's a murky basement of some office building, or a musty back room of a church, or an old bar-turned-12-step-meeting place, he's there. One day at a time. One meeting at a time. One step back at a time.

He earns a look for that, but Gavin's relentless. "You know what I'm talking about."

They haven't had _the talk_, the one where he's supposed to be down-to-the-bone honest with his wife. But he's so out of practice being honest with himself that he's not sure what the truth is right now.

Gavin doesn't buy it. "She knows your truth better than you do." A line of mustard marks the corner of the man's mouth. He attacks it with his napkin. "What step do you think you're working, Seeley?"

The first step is to admit you've got a problem, so he does, daily. Turning his life over to a higher power? Well, he saw what a bang-up job God did with Sweets and he's fudging over that one, has been for some time now. His higher power saw him locked up for something he did not do and saw Sweets killed trying to help him.

He needs his life back and he's not sure that his higher power's not going to fuck it up or fuck him over somehow. Right now, he's not sure of God or himself.

"You know how it works, Seeley." Gavin's giving him that squinty look, the one where he feels like he's on the wrong side of a microscope. "I thought we agreed it was important for you to talk to her, tell her what's been going on with you."

He knows it's supposed to be a _Lord of the Rings_ moment when the pull of the ring—_Bones' ring_—works its magic and changes him into a different man.

But he's not there yet.

Gavin bobs his head as if he's sorting out everything. "Suit yourself, Seeley." He picks up his sandwich. "She did you a favor, though. It took a lot of courage for her to make the statement she did." He's giving him the look over his corned beef. "And that ring? It got you to stop being in denial about the gambling. And while you're walking around with it, you just can't stop thinking about what you could lose if you don't work the program."

"You are walking around with it, aren't you?"

Truth has a funny way of curbing one's appetite and he stares down at the meat-lover's delight on his plate and almost pushes it away.

"The steps work, Seeley," Gavin says between mouthfuls. "But you can't pick and choose which ones you're willing to work."

oOo

Talk to his wife? Yeah, he does, although not in the way Gavin wants him to. Email. Text. How's Christine? Can I talk to her? Can I tuck my kid in for the night? He aches being a part-time dad, but for a while there, he wasn't much more than that when he lived under the same roof with her. Then he was always chasing the next gambling fix, the next high and he glossed over everything else. Now? Now each moment is precious. A man like him should know that, know how those moments can be stolen away—by creeps like Pelant, by shadowy governments, by murderers, by time itself.

Talk to his wife? What could he say? _I'm sorry?_ Every fiber of his being oozes sorry, but he knows the words alone are not enough. _I love you?_ He does. Desperately. Completely. Madly. But he pissed that away chasing winning streaks that were all about losing something important. _I want to come home._ His kitchenette will never be home; it needs his family to make it tolerable. Talk to his wife? Words alone are just not enough.

That's already fairly clear as he listens to the people in his meetings. Talk? He hears so much talk about so many fractured lives he feels like he's in a confessional. Or his own head. Thought I could control the uncontrollable. Check. Lost sight of what was important. Double check. Thank God I'm here. Triple check. Except for thanking God.

God, as far as he's concerned, has got nothing to do with him being here. The last time God got into his business, a good man died.

Recovery, he knows all too well, is all about giving up control, letting a higher power take over. Yeah, it's a paradox, as Bones would say, a chance to drop all the crap and start fresh, he'd say. In the program, you chose God, Buddha, Allah, doesn't matter. A rock, if it's your higher power, a stream. He once knew a guy who put his faith in his 12-year-old car. He hated to think what would happen to the guy when the car broke down.

If he's got to put faith into something, he'll put it into the ring he's holding onto. It's important to him; represents something he can touch and feel. No. _Someone_ he can touch and feel. _Someone_ who will always tell him the truth. _Someone_ who will not betray him.

And when he's ready, when he's the man she deserves, _then_ he'll talk to her.

oOo

"Dr. B?"

She stares at the graduate student for a second longer than necessary, the familiar greeting one she did not generally allow anyone but her interns.

"Dr. Brennan." The woman visibly gulps. "I think 5479 is a murder victim. He was shot."

A glance toward Wendell Bray tells her little except that the one intern she can find down here in long-term bone storage is embroiled in a contest of wills with two of her grad students who had pulled drawers with bones unearthed in the 1940s and 1950s respectively and are lobbying for more recent finds.

"Miss Whitcomb," she says with an emphasis on the courtesy title, "as much as I appreciate your desire to bring about justice for one of the many skeletal remains here in storage, I think it is as important to determine the age, sex and race prior to launching an investigation into his or her death." She pauses only to take in another breath. "Besides, from our records, 5479 was brought to the Jeffersonian in 1909."

Miss Whitcomb is not to be deflated. "I don't understand how the date the victim was brought in matters."

Suppressing a sigh, she explains the math. "The remains were discovered in an abandoned mine. Given the conditions of the mine as well as the depth of the discovery and factoring in predatory activity, it is safe to theorize that the victim had been killed one to three years prior to its discovery. Since children as young as 24 months have been known to accidentally discharge a weapon or wield a weapon, we may be looking for a killer as young as 108."

Dr. Saroyan often counseled her on trying to encourage her students and interns rather than discourage them, but she saw no value in that approach with someone like Miss Whitcomb. The young woman seemed overly intent on turning every drawer of bones into a case for the FBI.

"People are living longer, you know."

This time she does sigh. "Maybe you could simply attempt to identify the bones, Miss Whitcomb."

The graduate student fades from view as she stands to the side watching the other students bent over their projects. Wendell joins her in watching.

"They're just hoping to find Jimmy Hoffa."

The response is automatic. "I don't know what that means."

"Jimmy Hoffa was a pretty infamous union boss who went missing."

She's done far too many missing persons cases not to have heard the name and Googled it. "I'm not sure what the former president of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters who had clear connection to a large, violent crowd has to do with how the graduate students are approaching their work." She zones in on Miss Whitcomb who seems to relish the marks she's found on the bones that seem to indicate the victim had been stabbed repeatedly. She knows from experience that such marks could have been made in an industrial accident and the victim could just as easily been discarded in some unmarked grave rather than invite scrutiny. "But they all seem determined to turn each set of remains into a. . . ." Her thought is interrupted by the vibration of her phone. ". . . a sensational murder case rather than a simple identification."

"They just want to meet the real Andy," Wendell offers. "Speaking of. . . ."

She's holding the phone out, so Wendell has a clear view of the sender of the text message, but he, like so many of the others in the lab, start sentences the seem to have no real purpose since they don't finish them.

"Booth wants to pick up Christine and take her to the park before his meeting." What is ordinary is extraordinary these days since they began living apart and she considers the request.

"He's trying to be a good dad while he's working the program." Wendell's voice hints at an emotion she can't quite name. "He really misses her."

The emotion that hits her then also goes unnamed. But it's more than the discomfort of pregnancy or the hormonal shifts that cause her to clench her jaw and fight back the tears. She turns from Wendell. "Please instruct the students to identify the victims and the era—_no, year_—in which they lived before calling in the FBI."

Wendell offers a last thought. "They'll be disappointed. They really wanted to meet the Andy to your Kathy."

oOo

It takes her until well past the landing and a trip to the bathroom before she understands why she is so upset. Perhaps, she thinks, as she makes her way to her office, it is her own fault. Bringing a child into the world affords a multitude of responsibilities and the first and foremost is protection; Christine must be protected from the hard edges of life.

Well, it was Booth who coined that particular expression when they were first baby-proofing the house for a precocious toddler. She knows they must protect Christine from those _hard edges_, which includes Booth's relapse. While she refuses to sacrifice the truth, she has softened the edges, told Christine that her father is ill and needs to live away from them until he is better.

Her last image of Christine and Booth is last night's: her child held her hand to Booth's forehead and asked him if his tummy hurt.

She pauses as she opens her laptop, the latent image triggering another flood of emotion. But she knows it is more than mere sentimentality about how her husband and daughter interacted.

Wrapped around the pregnancy and the worry and the uncertainty is another truth beyond missing Booth: she fears she's lost more than just her wedding ring.


	21. Sobering Thoughts

**Sobering thoughts**

The hesitation at the door may be but a second, but it's enough as he considers turning around and heading back to his hermit's quarters. But a promise is a promise and he braves opening the door and stepping inside.

His eyes adjusts easily enough to the dim light provided by lights winking out from the ceiling and the colored lights of the neon signs near the bar, but his nose almost revolts at the smell. The stale beer is pervasive, but it's coupled with something that smells as if it died in here. He's been in some of the diviest of dives, but this one bests them all.

Past the bar where under the lights the bartender looks like an extra in a zombie film, past several tables where more zombies crane their necks to watch a small screen TV perched in an eagle's nest above the bar, past a man crumpled over a table, he finds the person he came to find.

He'd sit, but he doesn't know what he'd pick up in doing so.

"I'm here. What's going on?"

His brother looks up. "I'm not drinking, Seeley." He wraps his hand around a glass that's streaked and greasy. The hand's shaking until it clutches the glass. "Just club soda. That's all."

It could be club soda or vodka, he's not sure, but he's seen the look before in other men. "How many days?"

Jared tries a grin, but it's grim. "Three days. Thirty-six solid hours. Not one drink." He's staring at his hands, staring at the glass in hand. "Padme said I didn't have it. Couldn't manage a day without a drink and I've got three." He's fixated on the clear liquid. "Old man couldn't do it. No. Man wasn't sober a single damn day when we were growing up."

His brother's hanging on by a hair to his sobriety and maybe his sanity. "C'mon, Jared. Let me take you out of here and we'll go someplace else. Find a meeting. Keep the streak alive."

It's a false hope, which Jared practically destroys in a single word. "No. No. I don't do meetings. All that holding hands and vomiting feelings." He's trying to make a joke, but it's falling flat. "What would I do in there? Sing 'Kumbaya' with the drunks while we toast marshmallows instead of toasting with 25-year-old Scotch? No."

"You can't stay here."

He's hit with rheumy eyes that betray something of the boy Jared once was and the man he's become. "I can't stay here, I can't go to my place because Padme doesn't want me there. I can't go to your place because Tempe's kicked your sorry ass out."

He stops and bends toward his brother, his words sharp as knives. "What?"

The stare's good at bringing suspects to their knees but it holds no such magic over Jared.

"I stopped by the house to talk to you." Jared's steadying himself with two hands on the table as he stands. "Don't worry, Tempe didn't hang out the dirty sheets. But she'd be a lousy at poker." He straightens. "I figured it out, really. Cam just confirmed."

There's a tremor quaking through Jared's body. "I got a buddy I can maybe crash with."

"You're coming with me."

He makes the mistake of grabbing at Jared's arm and losing it as he shakes him off, but he's not losing the man. "Do you have a plan? Or are you going to stay here?"

"No plans." Jared's voice is gravelly. "No job, no wife, no place to go. No plans except to make it to four days."

He's seen that stubborn streak before, seen that granite edge in his brother that refuses to crack even as the tremors quake through his body.

His voice softens. "You're going to stay with me."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah."

Jared gives him a look. "A secret fort where no one but us can go."

It's an old dream from when they were kids and they had a father who used alcohol to fuel the rages and a mother who couldn't protect them. There's something innocent about it, something hopeful.

His voice softens. "Where we choose who comes in and who stays out."

"And you'll keep away the monsters." Jared gives him a sharp nod. "I'm not going to be able to get there on my own, Seeley." He looks down at his hands that still grip the chair. "Three days feel like three hundred." Their eyes meet.

He returns the nod. "That's what brothers are for, Jared."

This time when he takes Jared's arm to steady him, he doesn't resist. And he doesn't crack. But he does have one last request as they leave the walking dead of the bar for the fresh night air.

"I got dibs on the bed, Seeley."

oOo

Recovery is about ceding control to regain control on your life. After giving him some kind of anthropological lesson, Bones would probably call it a paradox, but he calls it a struggle as he wrestles with that need to control the uncontrollable. Oh, he believes that he's got too much to lose to actually give in, but the look from Jared makes him wonder if the crooked gene that the Booth men have can really be straightened out.

"Padme just doesn't understand."

He imagines the hair of the dog that bit him sitting far too close to his brother's hand even though it's at least 20 feet away behind a bar with a bartender who looks like he spends his paycheck on masking his identity in new ink. Jared stops eating only as long as it takes him to file a new complaint about his life.

Without Bones or Christine, he's making his way through a meat-lover's menu of take out restaurants and tonight is no exception as he's staring down a slab of ribs from Ed's BBQ Emporium. But the iced tea isn't anymore and Jared's problems as chewy as the meat.

"Look, if I could get ahead, get some money to pay off. . . ." He listens to Jared's ramblings, to a history not unlike those he's been hearing in meetings. ". . . I'll get back on my feet and I'll show her I'll be there for her. She's everything. My everything."

He says the words in exasperation before he has a chance to think.

"Then you wouldn't have made her think she was second best to the bottle, Jared." He's exasperated by his brother, a combination of _what ifs_ and _if onlys_ peppering his conversation for the past couple of days. "Is she really was your everything, if she really were, then you sure as hell wouldn't be drinking."

Substitute cards for bottle, gambling for drinking, and he'd have nailed his own situation.

"Clean hands calling the kettle black," Jared jabs back, the metaphor tripping over the ribs he's eating. "You tell _me_ my wife deserves better?"

Suddenly he doesn't have much of an appetite and he puts down the rib and tries to wash down the words with the watery tea.

Jared's licking at his fingers. "You need to get your own house in order, Seeley."

He says nothing, because there isn't much he hasn't said to his brother over the past three days and he'd just be repeating himself if he tried. Or opening himself up for more criticism.

"You marry someone because you love them and you want to give them a better life than they had before you." Jared's turned philosophical as he's turned away from drinking. "You got to prove to them every day that you're the best man. You're the guy who deserves them."

Jared's words fill him up and he pushes himself from the table. "Let me take care of the check and then I've got a meeting."

His brother's still finishing his meal, but he's not finished with his commentary. "How many of these meetings do you have to go to before you're no longer a gambler?" He's wiping his hands on his napkin. "I mean, you go to a meeting each night and you come back from your house after seeing your kid and you'd think Tempe would see that you're working at this and let you move back home."

"Ever think that maybe I don't think I'm ready?"

But Jared's not playing. He leans in. "Look, it's really not my place, but I get the impression that you'd have to run to the moon and back to please that woman, but she's too hard to please. She sees herself as perfect, so she expects you to be."

He grabs the check and pulls out his wallet and tries to make a show of how the words don't bother him, but something's niggling at the edge of his consciousness, something he can't quite name.

"Thing is," Jared says as he stands and stretches, "our wives deserve much better than they got."

oOo

She's falling asleep on his lap, her head lolling against his chest and he reads the last couple of lines softly, secretly dreading losing her to the night. When the story ends he closes the book and relishes holding her near. She's warm and light and somehow fits perfectly to him.

"You should put her in her bed, Booth."

He murmurs his agreement even as his back protests the movement and his heart wants more time with her.

And Bones.

But it's the rough deal he's made with both of them: he reads to Christine every night and then leaves his home for a different house, one he's built with his lies and arrogance and pays for by the week.

Yet he seems to be paying the bill daily.

Christine slips easily into her bed and he lingers on the kiss to her forehead. "'Night my little one."

She doesn't hear him, but he believes that the angels will guard her tonight, the angels and her mother. He's missing his daughter the moment he walks into the hall and he turns for a moment to capture one last memory before leaving.

"Would you like some tea?"

Most evenings spent like these have been awkward as they both learn to live this new kind of life. Bones says little, sadness tingeing the edges of her anger. But tonight she's offering something and he wonders if she's softening in her resolve.

"Tea?" He relaxes into a smile. "Uh, sure."

It's the herbal stuff she's been drinking and he's sure it's no better than the swill at the FBI or the dredge from the next meeting he's going to, but he accepts it and stands near the island in the kitchen sipping it.

"Are you gambling again?" she begins without any preamble.

The tea practically makes it's way up his nostrils at the surprise. "No, hell." He wipes at his nose. "I'm not gambling. I've been to all my meetings. I'm working the steps, Bones."

She's not drinking the tea, not doing much of anything but moving away from him. "The bank called. You withdrew $10,000. You spent almost $5,000 before that."

Her arms are crossed across her chest and rest on her swollen belly. "I told you I'm not gambling." Anger hones the edges of his words. "Why the hell would the bank call you?"

She's infinitely logical and infuriating at the same time. "When you lost that money before, I put in safeguards to protect Christine and me and our financial solvency."

"You put in safeguards?" The teacup bangs against the counter. "It's not enough for me to tell you that I'm not gambling? That I'm working very hard to move back home?"

"Why did you need that much money, Booth?"

Her tone, so calm and even, contrasts wildly with his own.

"It's my money, Bones. Or are you invoking some kind of ancient Chinese wish-woo-i-san to claim that it's your right to pry into my bank account?"

"What? That's not a real thing, Booth." He can't knock her from her position. "You said that when we married that our finances are all one big fund. You said, 'One big happy family,' but it's essentially the same. I simply used that as permission to request that the bank inform me of any large withdrawals." Her tone's become brittle. "I'm simply protecting our financial health."

"Well, I bet it."

It's a stupid thing to say, but he says it anyway and he pauses just long enough to see how much it hurts her. She's stunned and almost immediately he feels the guilt generated by years of catechism.

He waits a bit too long to make it right, but he tries.

"I bet it on Jared."

He takes baby steps toward her, hoping to bridge the gap he's made as he explains how he's betting on his brother's sobriety. "I opened up a checking account for him. All the money's there, except whatever Jared's already spent. I paid off some of the things he owed so he could start fresh. He's trying to stay sober, going to meetings. Even got him a security job."

He's talking fast, hoping that it will be enough, but he knows she's processing the information faster than he can provide it. That's abundantly clear when he finishes and she still looks unconvinced.

"I thought you weren't allowed to sponsor someone so early in your own sobriety."

He takes in a deep breath and tries to explain. "I'm not Jared's sponsor. No. He's got an old Navy fish as his sponsor. I'm just. . . I'm just helping." She's eyeing him like he's burned garlic on the stove and he shifts under her gaze. "Bones, he's my brother."

"I thought we agreed that it would be foolish to lend Jared any money."

He's shaking his head. "I don't expect to see any of the money. It's not a loan."

"So you _bet_ on him."

The word crashes around them and he realizes that he's done nothing to allay her concerns.

"Yeah," he finally admits. "I bet on Jared just like you bet on your brother. That loan for the repair shop?" He shrugs, trying to ease the tension. "You bet on your brother to pay back the money without any real hope that he'd be able to. Two daughters, one sick. Medical bills. A new business. You've got to admit that the odds are against ever seeing any of the money you gave him and I have to say, Russ got far more from you than $10,000."

The crossed arms, the guarded look, he knows he's comparing one brother with a track record of the straight and narrow to another who's only recently given up booze and her investment in Russ had been just that, an investment. His money? A wish burned in a candle flame with the hope it would come true.

"You do what you can for family."

It's the only thing that makes sense, the only thing that he can say. It's enough to soften the edges on Bones' face, to ease the rigid body language that has so far been remote and cold. There's a slow nod that accompanies the thaw and he lets out the breath he's been holding.

"Family."

"Yeah, Bones. Family."

She's faster at seeing the opening than he is. "So, what about our family?"

He's not ready to talk about that, not ready to talk about them, but all he can do is look at his feet then look up, trying to ease the uncertainty.

"I know you're doing what you think is best for Jared just as I did what I thought best for Russ. And I'll trust you when you tell me that the money is going to help him."

She pauses, then says something that is almost bittersweet. "I love you, Booth."

He smiles at that, knows he loves her, but that it might not be enough to find his balance. And as they stand there, the smile fades and the tea grows bitter and he knows he's still far away from coming home.


	22. Barrels of Something

**Barrels of Something**

The smell of decomposition hits his nostrils the moment he abandons his umbrella for the relative protection afforded by the popup tent. The rain threatens to turn the gulleys and ruts into rivers and streams and he wants this site inspection done quickly before they're all engulfed in mud.

It's just Cam perched under the tent and with the rain continuing to beat down around them, she's just as keen on getting this done.

"This was used as a area for anyone with two wheels and a strong desire to break their neck." Cam's New York snarky has come to play. "A couple of riders were out here and one crashed into the barrel," she says, her chin pointing toward the two boys. "Out popped a few body parts and you know the rest."

The body—or really body parts—have spilled out of the barrel and look more like a 3-D jigsaw puzzle waiting to be reassembled.

"Someone hacked him up to fit the barrel?"

Cam nods. "Dr. Brennan said it had to be an axe. Probably a fire axe."

He's learned not to question Bones on most things like this and he makes a note of it on an index card.

"She give us anything else?"

He jots down the _who_ as far as they know, a white male in his 30s, 6' or better, chopped up and pushed down a barrel to be forgotten.

"With budget cuts, the National Park Service doesn't pay that much attention to this area as long as no one dies or gets mauled." He surveys what he can see outside the tent. The rain has kicked into gear and is drenching the area, leaving as far as he can see a washed-out gray. "Killer knows this place well enough to know he can dump a body here, but isn't smart enough to figure someone might crash into one of these and take it down."

Cam shrugs. "He needs to dump the body somewhere, so why not here?"

Why not? Motorized bikes have chewed up the hills and valleys creating ruts that are now channeling the water their way. A glance toward Cam and she's about to say something, but quickly closes her mouth and purses her lips tight. He can only guess she's got something to say about Jared or his situation and she's thought better of it. He's not sure he wants to brook the subject.

So he shifts his focus back toward the case. Something's off, but he can't see it yet. "Hodgins get his samples?" The rain beats steady and sure. "We should wrap this up, Cam, before we need an ark to get out of here."

Then it hits him. A clearing in the rain confirms it. There's another barrel like this one in the distance. And probably another, and another.

"Damn." He points toward a barrel that is merely a dab of gray-blue through the curtain of rain. "We should have a couple of techs check out the rest of these barrels." He doesn't look forward to asking them to do a slip-and-slide in this rain looking for more bodies.

"Already on it."

As if on cue, a dark squarish blob rolls into view, stops, then splits off into three smaller blobs. Only when they get within 5 or 6 feet of the tent do they come into focus.

It's Hodgins in full rain garb—_all the man needs is a snorkel_, he thinks—and one of the techs sharing an umbrella with Bones.

She's treading as well as she can with the baby altering her center of gravity and he braves the last couple of feet to make sure she doesn't slip.

"I'm fine, Booth," she tells him as he takes her elbow to keep her steady through the mud soup.

_I still get to worry, _he thinks to himself. She's tired looking and if he remembers anything about the first pregnancy he knows that she's probably in that stretch where getting a full night's sleep is dodgy at best.

"Any other surprises?" He's hoping against hope that no one's turned this bike track into a holding pen for multiple bodies.

"We scanned the barrels along the north," Hodgins explains. "Looks to be nothing but mineral dust and quartz inside them. Your techs are scanning the barrels along the east and west routes."

"Then let's get this packed up and sent off to the lab."

He's not chancing anything with the rain creeping into little rivulets around their shoes and he helps Hodgins and the tech load the barrel into the back of the Jeep while Cam and Bones extract the spilled body parts and place them into a body bag. It's messy work and his shoes are mud-caked sponges, but they manage.

Under the tent, Hodgins has picked up a shovel and offers it to him. "You want to do the honors?"

He's shaking off the water and shaking off the shovel. "No. You're the dirt guy."

"I think we can take it from here, Seeley."

Cam's doing that thing, casting her eyes sideways toward Bones and Hodgins is standing there like that farmer in the Grant Wood painting except he's looking far more hopeful. Suddenly he's back in high school with his friends trying to get him to dance with the pretty girl.

And she is pretty. Even in the grey light with specks of mud on a face made softer with the pregnancy, he's struck again at just how beautiful she is.

"Let me take you back to the lab, Bones." He's not had much opportunity to be alone with her even with his treks to the house to see Christine, the new rules still ill-defined since she laid out her ultimatum.

She's not only beautiful, but stubborn as well. "I should stay with the remains until Dr. Saroyan. . . ."

Cam and Hodgins do their best to push her to ride with him and he's the guy waiting on that first dance all over again, but it works finally and she is huddled with him under the umbrella as they make their way to his SUV.

And it's silence all the way.

That continues as he points the truck back toward the city. A glance toward Bones tells him that whatever she's thinking about, it's probably straight ahead.

He breaks the silence.

"I'm sorry I couldn't tuck in Christine the last couple of nights. I got called in on the Schuler case."

"I understand, Booth."

He sighs. "Did Christine understand?"

"She knows that you love her and would have been there if you could. I think she appreciated the fact that you talked to her via a video link."

He'd snuck into his office to do that, away from the wild dash of FBI agents trying to do the impossible in a 36-hour marathon, scarfing down a dry turkey sandwich chased by bad coffee, but it had been worth it to hear her giggle and see her smile.

"What about you?"

She's been quiet, oppressively so, and he's never quite sure of what's going on in her mind these days. He's only sure that she's got a right to give him a verbal beat down for splitting their family this way, but she does what she often does; she surprises him.

"I would like to know if you are performing the steps of your recovery program in the manner in which they are to be accomplished?"

"What?" The word explodes from his mouth before he can translate the question. It's not how he wants to talk to her, but she doesn't react, simply looks at him with a calmness he wished he had.

"Performed?" The word suggests someone acting rather than doing and he's not comfortable with it. "I'm not performing the steps. I'm _working_ them." He starts over. "When you're in the program, it's called working the steps, Bones. I'm not just pretending that I'm doing them, I'm actually working at them, trying to make changes so that I can come home."

"So you can keep from gambling so you can come home." A glance tells him she's furrowed her brows and squinted her eyes and he's in for some kind of lesson. "I mean _performing_ as in acting upon, to carry out, accomplish or fulfill as in an action or task or function. I can see why you would be confused. Perform is from the Old French _par_ meaning through to completion and _fourmir_ meaning. . . ."

"I understand, Bones," he says slowly, carefully. "Really."

"So are you?"

"Working the steps?" He's not sure what she's asking beyond the obvious. "Yeah. I'm working them. Going to meetings. Doing what I have to do."

"Does that include talking to your God?"

This is the sucker punch, the question he never saw coming. "What does that have to do with anything?"

"It's part of the doctrine of your 12-step program. As I understand it, at least 5 of those steps require interaction with your invisible deity."

He sputters, not sure what to respond to first—the steps of the program, the mention of an "invisible deity" or the fact that she's bringing up God in the first place.

"I've got it, Bones. I'm working the program and I'm fine."

"Are you, Booth?" She's nothing if not persistent. "You have, in the past, found comfort in talking to your god."

"I'm talking, Bones."

"To your god?"

He shifts in the driver's seat. "No. I'm. . . I'm using your rings as a higher power."

"As a talisman."

"Talisman?"

"Yes. An object that is said to contain certain magical or sacramental properties. Something that is thought to provide good luck to the one who possesses it."

He shifts again. "Yeah. It was good luck when I married you."

It's a joke that's more than half serious meant to drive the queries in another direction, but the woman just doesn't quit.

"I'm serious, Booth. The ring represents our marriage and the emotional bond you feel toward me. But is it enough? Is it the same kind of connection you have with your transparent being? Is it as all-encompassing as that?"

He squirms again, the driver's seat suddenly very uncomfortable.

"As long as I have known you, Booth, you have been a man of faith. I don't believe, but you do. It is a part of you just as your hand or your heart is a part of you. It's helped you when you've been injured and helped you when you've had doubts. It's sustained you through all the difficult times of your life. It's helped you have a better relationship with your mother and with your brother. It's allowed you to maintain a cordial relationship with Rebecca, especially when she took Parker with her to England. It's who you are, Booth."

"As I understand it, your twelfth step requires you to have found a spiritual awakening or reawakening as part of your recovery. Can you have a shift in consciousness, some kind of apperception of reality that had previously been unrealized with the ring as your talisman? Can you have a recovery without talking to your god?"

oOo

"A lot of anger here."

Aubrey's flipping through the pile of lab photos, just a couple of feet in front of his desk. He really should be focusing on the case, but his thoughts are elsewhere.

"According to your wife, this guy had 157 cut marks on him. Think the guy who did this was in some kind of blind fury to chop him up like that."

He almost feels like he's got 157 open wounds on him, but he keeps that to himself. Out of habit, he reaches for the photos. Mixed in are the dump site photos which seem like a million miles away despite the fact that he had been there this morning.

"You okay?" Aubrey's giving him the once over and he feels too raw to be under his magnifying glass.

"Ruined a good pair of shoes out there." He stops at one of the photos, an image of the clothing that was stuffed into the barrel with the body. Hodgins—_probably_—had washed out the mud to reveal a logo.

"Did Angela figure out where this is from?" He's pointing toward the design, a cube with a fancy R in it. "I've seen this before."

"It doesn't match the insignia worn by our bikers." Aubrey's on top of the case. "Apparently there's five groups that share that spot for break-neck loops and jumps. According to one of the bikers, they pretty much have a schedule that everyone tries to adhere to in order to avoid any trouble."

"Any of them missing?"

"Not yet." He points toward the logo. "Can't be that difficult to figure out. . . ."

The computer dings and a photo and name appear on cue. "Glenn Howatt. Investment banker. Reinhold Security Bank."

He pauses for a second too long, inviting another inquiry into his well being. "You really don't look like you're okay."

But he's not about to go down that road, not today. He grabs the list of bikers from the edge of his desk. "Let's see if any of these people have a relationship with Reinhold Security Bank."

oOo

It's a familiar bar even if it's not his regular haunt. Dim lights, neon, a TV set to the latest sports show, two talking heads volleying about the upcoming matchup somewhere. But he's not here for the drinks, nor for the sports talk. He slides into the first empty stool and leans into the bar.

"You look like you've had a one of those days."

He touches his cheekbone, bruised courtesy of a pissed investor who'd been drinking since he killed his investment banker. He'd saved Aubrey from being 6" shorter and caught the edge of something tackling their killer.

"Caught the bad guy."

"Deserves a drink." Aldo sets a glass in front of him and pours him a shot of whiskey. "On the house."

He considers the drink, but thinks better of it. He's not been drinking much what with Jared underfoot and attending any 12-step meeting including those for the addicts and the alcoholics. The stories have curbed his thirst.

"Can I ask you something?"

Aldo nods while he pours a drink. "I'm still not a priest, Booth."

"That's what I wanted to ask you," he says as he toys with the shot glass. "Why aren't you a priest anymore?"

That earns him a long, low whistle. "You must have really had a bad day." Aldo drinks his whiskey, then sets the glass down on the bar. "This isn't really about my faith, is it? It's about yours."

He's still not ready to acknowledge what Bones exposed the other morning, still not ready to look too closely at the widening crater that is his conscience. Aldo waits as he used to, waits for the confessor to outline his sins, but he can't think of any new ones he's committed save one.

"What is it, Booth? You finally realize that God's been screwing with you and you can't quite forgive him?"

If the question is made half in jest, he can't tell. He's feeling his own brand of misery, the kind where he's engulfed in guilt and anger.

"That's it, isn't it, Booth?" It's barely a whisper, but Aldo's nailed the truth.

A couple of regulars call out to Aldo as they make their way to the door, but he merely waves at them.

"Look, Seeley, I understand better than most. You were taught to have unconditional belief in God, but somehow he's failed you and you've drifted away, maybe ran in the opposite direction as fast as you could." Aldo leans in closer. "But now you're feeling that good old Catholic guilt about holding him at arm's length."

"So what do I do about it?"

Aldo straightens and pours another shot of whiskey for himself. His own drink sits untouched.

"First, you should probably acknowledge why you're angry with him. Frankly, I'm surprised it's taken you this long to tell him to take a hike. You've had some pretty rough summers and this last one. . . ." He leaves the rest of the sentence hanging since they both know all-too-well what happened during those months. "You're guilty about your feelings, but you've got a right to feel a bit betrayed by what's happened."

"Again, what do I do?"

This time, Aldo picks up a rag and begins to wipe at the counter. "Open up a bar somewhere far away from this one. I don't need the competition."

"I'm serious."

Aldo huffs and puts down the rag. "The bottom line is always going to be are you better off with Him in your life or without Him?"


	23. Things Unseen

**Things Unseen**

He wields the SUV like a knife, slicing through traffic as he answers the call. It's a race with time, but time is winning the race, unfettered by gravity and the fools driving in front of him, blind to his flashing light and deaf to his siren.

Distracted driving or not, he's on the phone trying to locate his brother who's gone missing with his friend, Kevin, on some hunting trip. He's halfway toward calling in the resources of the FBI when he hits the turn-off and steers his vehicle toward the hospital. He gives Jared one more call, leaves a fifth message for his brother before trying Padme.

She picks up after the third ring.

Their relationship, filtered through his brother and rocky from the start, is mirrored in her response to his voice, but she thaws a bit when he tells her why he's calling.

"If you hear from Jared, just make sure he gets the message," he repeats. "St. Joseph's Hospital."

He doesn't wait for her to end the call before he does as he pulls into the drive of the hospital and looks for a spot before jumping out of the vehicle and heading toward the emergency entrance.

And he hopes he's not too late.

His ID earns him a free pass upstairs to the ICU and he takes the elevator to the third floor only to meet up with Nurse Ratchett who wants more than an FBI shield and charm smile before she'll let him past her desk. But in the battle between professional intimidators, he manages a small victory and is directed to a hallway that opens up into a suite of glass enclosures each starring a single bed and with a supporting cast of machinery and computer screens. He doesn't need anything more than his eyes to find the right room.

"I'm here, Pops."

oOo

It's funny what old habits show up in the most dire of times. Or maybe it's not funny or odd or unexpected, really. He takes the old man's hand and pulls a chair up to the bed and refuses to let go as he watches for some sign of recognition in his face.

And he sends up a pray to God.

It's a one-sided conversation much like the one he holds with his grandfather. "I called Jared, but he's off hunting deer or fishing or something right now with a buddy." The words don't really matter because he's just talking to talk, trying to convince himself that the man can hear him. "I left a message, so he'll be here as soon as he can be."

He keeps talking as one machine beeps and another one counts the respirations and another records the heartbeats. "You know, we've been meaning to have you over to the house. Christine's got a nice new treehouse in the back. It's better than the old one. Fixed all the mistakes I made on the first one. And the new baby? Bones is the best mom. She's eating all that healthy stuff and. . . ."

The words aren't important, just the tone. It's hopeful and steady and it's from the boy who grew to be a man because of this man's guidance and he doesn't want to let him down.

"Jared's working the program, got himself a sponsor. It might take. It just might. . . ."

The vital numbers go up and down slightly as he talks and while he's been in a hospital enough times to know what they mean, their significance eludes him save for one thing: they mean Pop's alive and that's all that's important right now.

"Are you a relative?"

He turns to find another nurse. "Grandson."

She introduces herself, but he can promptly forgets her name as she begins to record information from the machines.

"How's he doing?" He holds onto Pop's hand willing his own strength into his grandfather, asking God to spare the man who spared him.

The nurse does what nurses sometimes do, evades the question. "The doctor will be in later to speak to you."

"I just need to know if he's. . . okay. If he's going to be okay."

He gets the tilt of the head, the look of a woman who's been asked that question hundreds of times, but she has pity on him and gives him an answer he can at least hold onto.

"If he can hold on through the night, he stands a good chance," she says. "I've seen it many times. Just keep talking to him, being here with him. He'll know."

And so he hangs on, through many choruses of beeps and sighs from the machine.

oOo

"Booth?"

Bones stands at the entrance to the waiting room, expectant and uncertain. Before he can say anything, she awkwardly gives him a hug, and he relishes the closeness even if the baby bump keeps them mostly apart. She even apologizes for not getting there sooner.

"Max just went down to see Russ and Amy this morning and I couldn't reach the woman that we call." She deposits her messenger bag on the chair. "Angela took Christine for what she called a pj party."

He shouldn't be fazed by anything his wife does, but she surprises him still, especially when she gives his hand a squeeze.

"You didn't have to come, Bones." They're merely words, ones he says automatically but he's glad she's here. He's touched, he really is, and she gives him that quirk of her head that tells him his objection is baseless.

"Hank's family." She's wedded to that mantra, but she softens it with the real reason she's here. "You shouldn't be here alone."

And with that he fills her in on what he knows which isn't much: Pops is heavily sedated following a heart attack. Bones does what Bones does best by taking charge and nosing her way into Pops' room to talk on the same level with the nurse while exercising the strength of her three doctorates to take a look at the medical chart. Within a few minutes of arriving, she has the skinny on Pops' condition as well as his prognosis.

Of course, she loses him with all the medicinal gobblelygook: "They're giving the heart muscle time to heal with large doses of angiotensive converting enzyme inhibitors to improve blood flow, spironolactone as a diuretic, digoxin. . . ."

And he lets her talk, lets her outline everything that's being done while he waits for Pops to wake and call him Shrimp and reassure him he's going to live a bit longer if not forever.

"Just. . . just what's the bottom line, Bones?"

She's thoughtful, but only long enough to dumb it down for him. "The first 24 to 36 hours are critical for someone like him." She takes his hand, and he feels some of her strength. "They're doing everything they can under the circumstances."

And with Bones here to translate, that's all he can ask for.

oOo

The waiting room fulfills its purpose and they spend the time quietly, Bones on her laptop while he alternates between pacing and reading articles from an ancient sports magazine or small bursts of talk. He recalls a time when Pops stayed up with him all night while he heaved his guts out.

"I had to be 12, 13 and I had the flu or food poisoning or something, but nothing stayed down and Pops, he stayed up with me, making sure I got to the bathroom, or if I couldn't, he had this bucket with lemon dish soap in the bottom; oh, I can remember the smell of that stuff. And when there wasn't anything else left in my stomach, he made sure I had warm 7Up and crackers. Saltines. Yeah."

"You would have done the same, Booth. You _have_ done the same."

He's sitting now, elbows on his thighs, his hands dangling between his knees and he's not sure of much right now. "I want to let him know I turned out okay."

The words come slowly, painfully because he's made a mess of things lately.

"You did turn out okay. You are a good man, Booth. Hank knows that."

The tears burn his eyes and he's sure the fluorescent lights and the late hour have something to do with it and he wipes at them then shakes his head. "I messed up, Bones. I messed up."

"You made a mistake, Booth."

He takes another swipe at the tears and turns to look at her. Maybe it's a glitch caused by her pregnancy brain that she's forgotten the last couple of months, but the look she gives him is pure Bones, sure and smart, yet he doesn't feel he made a simple mistake.

"I messed up _us_. You and me. That's pretty important, Bones. I put the gambling first. I neglected you. I'm neglecting you now. You and Christine. I'm not home because I've got to focus on making things right between us and I'm not sure I'm getting any closer to making that happen."

There's that tilt of the head and a look he knows so well. "I don't feel neglected, Booth, well, _for the most part_." There's a pause. "In any case, you're a phone call away. And you see or talk to Christine every day. You are a good father, Booth. And you're a good man. A bad man would not admit to his mistakes or try to rectify them."

"I should remind you of that the next time Max screws up." He gives her a sideways look and tries to grin, but he's not feeling he's made much progress. He pulls the St. Christopher medal from his neck and holds onto the silver metal.

"That's the medal Hank gave you?"

She knows the answer to the question, but he nods anyway and supplies the tag line. "He gave it to me when I first shipped out. Patron saint of travelers."

"And touching it makes you feel better?"

Anyone else would understand, yet it's not a question asked in ignorance, but meant to better comprehend his actions. "You know I feel better because Pops gave it to me. St. Christopher means something to me. He brought me home safely from war zones and. . . ," he stops. "You know all this, Bones."

When she tilts her head just so, he can catch just how blue her eyes are. "I know that you generally feel better when you talk to me or to your god. . . ."

"Talk to my god? Why are you bringing that up, Bones? You don't believe. " His voice is getting that hard edge and he takes a breath and tries to soften it. "Think of all the fights we don't have to have now over whether Christine and the little bruiser go to church or Sunday school."

It's meant to cut off this thread of the conversation, but she's not one to let go. "I have to admit that I'm diasappointed."

"Disappointed? Why?"

"I'm disappointed because I believe it would have been a good idea to expose the children to different forms of religion with an emphasis on the spiritual components. . . ."

"What?" The edge is back.

"I think it would be quite educational for the children to be exposed to different forms of religion to allow them to make informed choices about whether they want to believe. I think they would both benefit from an understanding of the spiritual aspect. . . ."

She continues on with her argument, but he's suddenly uncomfortable in his own skin and begins to stretch and squirm then stands up quickly as if to unlock the joints that have been in one position far too long.

"You are doing it again."

"What?" He swivels his head on his neck trying to banish the ache. "What am I doing?"

Her eyes get squinty. "You squirm and fidget in your seat or do what you've done now, stand and move about in the same way you do in the morning when you are trying to stretch out your muscles."

"I've been sitting for a long time."

She sighs. "If Sweets were here, he would say. . . ."

"Sweets isn't here." The edge in his voice is back. "Don't start. You don't know anything about psychology."

"If Sweets _were_ here, he would say that you are physically uncomfortable with the topic because you are at war with yourself."

"Just stop it." He chops at the air between them. "Just stop. I'm fine."

She's not backing down, that's clear from how steady she looks at him. "You're not fine, Booth."

"I'm worried about Pops." He's not budging, either. His body feels like one big cramp, but he's not shifting a muscle. "And don't bring up Sweets."

"I know you're worried about Hank. You keep telling me that you're all right, Booth, but you're not."

"How the hell do you know how I am, Bones? Huh? We haven't been living together for the last couple of weeks and you can't tell me how I'm feeling. Isn't that something that Sweets taught you?"

There's a dozen more arguments behind her silence, but he doesn't want to hear them. He begins to pace. "Let it go. Just let it go, okay?" He's driving his anger into the floor. "I'm worried about Pops. That's why I'm here. Then you start bringing up my god and Sweets and just let it go. All right?" He stops for a moment to collect himself, but he feels scattered, in a million pieces. "I don't know what you want from me, Bones. Huh?"

She's the calm to his storm. "I just want you to be all right, Booth."

oOo

He leaves her in the waiting room curled up on the sofa there, a purloined pillow and blanket now her only company. While it might be against the rules to stay the night, the nursing staff has looked the other way, ignoring them, providing small bits of comfort in the bedding and a free pass into the nurse's lounge where the better coffee can be found.

A restlessness keeps him from joining her in trying to find some sleep. A restlessness that Pops would call a worried mind. Or would it be Sweets? Memories of Sweets certainly rattle around in his mind as do those of Pops and he cannot quiet them long enough to sleep.

So he walks the corridors of the hospital, his emails long checked and answered, the quiet of the halls there almost oppressive. He walks and finds himself at an open door, about the only one someone like him is allowed access to.

The chapel.

For a moment—hell, more than a moment—he pauses, uncertain he's welcome here. It's a small room with four neat little pews meant to hold no more than 4 or 5 people. The stained glass window to the east side of the room offers no color, no comfort. There's a crucifix on the wall to remind him of Jesus' own trials, while a large statue of St. Joseph stands in the front, his hands steepled in prayer. Behind him, there's print of Jesus in a garden setting holding his hands out to a little girl.

"Here I am." He whispers the words, before taking a couple steps inside. "Here to talk to my god."

It's his wife's phrase, an atheist's take on the act of prayer, implying some kind of conversation. But he's got nothing to say.

He sighs and folds himself into the last row, his feet and legs welcoming the rest. Closing his eyes, he leans forward and rests his head on his arms.

The subdued lighting, the late hour, his own exhaustion give him a few moments of peace as he drifts into a semi-meditative state, but it doesn't last long. His mind, unable to let go, starts niggling at him. He looks up and sighs.

St. Joseph stands by mutely.

"Pop's a good man," he says. The statue doesn't change its expression. "I must be crazy," he says softly to himself. He sighs. "I wish I had the faith you had." He takes a breath and starts again. "Hank Booth is a real good man. I don't want to lose him, not before my son is born."

"I'd like him to meet my son before you take him."

He breathes in and releases it in another sigh. "Let me tell you something you might have forgotten. He and Grams had this spidery old crab tree that just dropped apples by the bushel and Grams wanted Jared and me out there to pick them up. There had to be a ton of apples on the ground. But Pops came out one afternoon, saw we hadn't really done much cleaning up and he asked us if we found out anything special about those apples. All either one of us knew was that you couldn't eat the damn things, they were wormy and hard as rocks or so rotten they fell apart when you picked them up. And there were so many of them. Well, Pops picked up one of those apples, cut it open with his pocket knife and inside the apple was a bright, shiny dime." He set his arms on the back of the pew in front of him and grinned at the memory. "He cut open a second one and inside that was a nickel. He called it the money tree. Said that not every apple had money in it, but you'd never be able to find out if you left them to rot on the ground. Said that those didn't even give up pennies."

He remembered how they'd spent so much time trying to kick the apples into the neighbor's yard rather than pick them up. "Jared and I raced to pick up those damned apples, raced each other to see who could find the most apples with money inside them. Some had nothing in them. One had a big old worm that he tossed over into the garden. But there were enough of the money apples out there, enough so that two little boys had enough money jingling in their pockets that they could buy ice cream cones when the ice cream truck came around."

He loves this early memory of his grandfather. He swipes at his eyes. "Look, you're going to do what you're going to do, but if you give him some more time, give him enough so he can see our little guy. I'd like him to know. . . ." The tears drop freely. "I'd just like, well, you know."

His request is met with silence, but for some reason, just making it gives him hope.


	24. Fragile

**Fragile**

She wakes in the familiar-yet-unfamiliar surroundings of the waiting room, her cat-nap (a term she's borrowed from one of Christine's books) doing little more than making her feel more groggy. But the baby presses on her bladder and she makes the trek to the washroom then double backs to the ICU room where Hank lies.

A soft light overhead provides just enough illumination to navigate and she does, taking the chair from along the wall and pulling it over to the bed. She sits and takes Hank's hand in hers.

The numbers on the computer readout have changed little since the last time she checked and she takes that as a good sign.

"Booth is here, somewhere," she says softly, her fingers smoothing the wrinkled flesh of his hand. "He's very worried about you."

She expects no miracle sign, no spontaneous healing with her words. "Research studies indicate that talking to comatose patients may actually be beneficial to their recovery," she points out. "Studies also indicate that touch may help in speeding the process of healing and may have long-term effects on a patient's well-being."

She pats his hand. "Beyond the potential benefits to you," she admits. "I find that talking to you makes me feel better."

Above her the machine makes its own silent commentary, flashing numbers and counting her grandfather-in-law's vital signs.

"Beyond his worry for you, Booth is. . . ." She sighs. "Booth is very. . . _something_." An articulate woman, she cannot find the right word to describe Booth's present state of mind. Neurons fire and warn her of this approach, but she presses on. "He seems certain that you don't know that he's turned out well." She squeezes his hand. "I think he needs to hear you tell him how proud you are of him. I don't understand. He seems. . . lost somehow."

The lights continue to beat upon the screen. Hank's breaths are regular, even, a combination of the oxygen being fed to him through tubes and the drugs coursing through his body.

"I know he's angry." That much is certain. He reacted badly to her assessment, his lips tight and thin, his actions toward her almost. . . distant. _Still_ distant. She sighs again. "Not at you. Maybe at this situation. Maybe at not being able to control things, but he. . . ." She checks herself from straying. "He loves you very much. I think in some way, he's tried to be like you because he admires you. I've never told him what you saw that day, why you took him away from his father, but I believe that Booth knows you rescued him. You certainly gave him a better life than the one he would have had with his father."

The hand she's holding flexes a tiny bit. The dim light might be playing tricks on her eyes, but she detects movement beneath his paper-thin lids.

"Booth's a good man because of you. And usually Booth realizes that. Not that he's a good man only because of you, but that his actions are for the good." She stops, uncertain of how to make her point. The baby turns and she adjusts her position so he can place Hank's hand on her belly. "The baby's moving. We were going to surprise you, but I don't think Booth would mind if I told you it's a boy."

She has no hope that Hank is hearing her, only a wisp of a wish. The baby ends its dance within and she replaces Hank's hand on the bed and finds a comfortable position on the chair.

"Booth is a good man and I love him." Again, she's drawing a blank, unsure of what she is trying to say, exhaustion clouding her thoughts. For a moment, she leans back in the chair and closes her eyes, holding onto Hank's hand as if a lifeline.

"I just wish I knew how to help him."

oOo

He's given up on pacing around the small chapel, settling for letting his mind do a kind of haphazard walk around the room.

"I don't know why I'm here. I stopped going to church because it felt. . . wrong." He stops, tries to find the right word. "Hypocritical?" It still isn't the right word. "I just. . . just felt. . . pissed off." A small part of him wants to cross himself at the phrase, but he doesn't give in to the old habit. "I was mad. Real mad."

"Still am."

Closing his eyes, he tries to think, tries to remember why he became angry, why he began using Sundays to get a coffee and read the paper at that little café near the house rather than listen to the homily or take communion. He looks up at St. Joseph. "My middle name is Joseph. Seeley Joseph Booth. . . . But you know that."

His mind's still pacing, still following a path with no real destination. "Why is it that I believe that, but I don't want to talk to . . . _him_?" He nods his head toward the image of Jesus in the garden. "I stopped going, stopped praying because. . . hell, where did it get me?"

He sighs. "Maybe I came here thinking it might make a difference. I usually felt better but. . . I don't know. I mean, I know that Pops is. . . ." He can't bring himself to say it and stares at the statue for a moment before he can find the words. "You know, He took Grams way too early. But he'll be back together with her. . . _eventually_, when the time comes. And I believe that. I do believe that."

_Pops has had a good life_, he thinks to himself. _But I'm not ready to say goodbye just yet. _If it is a prayer, it's been one he's been praying since he got the call. "You know Pops misses Grams. I don't think a day goes by without him thinking about her."

The gruff old MP always had a soft spot for his love. Hell, the man has one gooey soft center for anyone he loved. "He's a good guy, you know. I tried to make him proud of me." He knows he's much like his grandfather and he's proud of that. "Yeah, he's a good guy. A sweet man." It's not how he'd usually describe his grandfather, but it fits. And it triggers something inside him. "Another person you took early, way too early, was Sweets." This time, there's an edge to his tone, hard and unforgiving and it almost surprises him.

For several minutes he says nothing because. . . well, he doesn't know what to say. Looking within only exacerbates the roiling emotions within.

"Bones says I'm too sensitive about. . . you know," he says finally. Earlier that evening, she said that he showed 'remarkable sensitivity' about Sweets. At the time, she'd pissed him off, made him want to shut down any talk of Sweets. "It's just hard to talk about him." He takes a deep breath. Then another.

"You know, I've been mad. Pretty damn mad, actually." He sinks into one of the pews. He tries to sort through the emotional baggage that he's been dragging around with him for months. "I. . . I got over a lot of it, I thought. Thought I'd put it all away. But something happens and it's back. That case. Being jailed and all." St. Joseph's expression remains. . . beatific. . . _is that the word?_ He studies the statue's face. "Some days I wanted to punch Stark. Just belt him one for believing that I would kill three of our own in some kind of. . . I don't know." He gives up on the thought, the anger within only pushing him so far in the explanation. "I know he was lied to, but he gave up on the man and that's what. . . . And the other agents. Spent years working beside them and they were all willing to throw me under the bus." His eyes sting suddenly. "But Sweets? He risked everything. He believed in me. No doubts."

"And then he was gone."

The last words come out as a groan and a tear marks his shirt as he sits, remembering that day—Aubrey's call, Sweets on the ground, his last words. . . .

He rubs his eyes and looks at St. Joseph.

"And here I am, talking to myself in the middle of the night, when I should be. . . ." He makes a motion with his thumb toward the door behind him, but he doesn't move. There are no answers given in the silence around him, but he finds one anyway. "I hate collateral damage. Sweets shouldn't have been there, he shouldn't have died. He was a good guy. I never understood why you let that happen."

Again there's no answer from the statue. On the wall, Jesus continues to reach out to the child in the garden, his attention elsewhere.

"I guess that's why I gave in, why I went ahead and gambled when I knew better. I wanted to feel something else."

The words are whispered, but they speak loudly of something he's been unable or unwilling to articulate.

"I needed a different outcome."

oOo

Drifting along the edges of sleep, she feels a finger brushing her shoulder. At first she thinks it's Christine trying to wake her, but the momentary confusion is erased when she hears her name, low and gravelly.

"Temperance."

Her eyes open and she's standing by the bed in an instance. "Hank?"

Even in the poor light, she can see his eyes, liquid and unfocused. "You having the baby already?"

"No," she tells him. "You had a heart attack." She outlines the diagnosis, but pauses when he closes his eyes.

"Hank?"

With his free hand, he wiggles two fingers. " know this heart has an expiration date on it." His voice is low and gravely. "Could you. . . water?"

She looks around and finds the water pitcher and pours some into a cup and takes it to him, cradling his head as he takes a few sips.

He smacks his lips and closes his eyes. "I'll just hang out here." She pauses to kiss his forehead, when he signals again with his hand. "Seeley's lucky to have you."

She says nothing, watching him for a second or two longer before heading into the hospital to look for Booth.

oOo

He's done more talking tonight than he's done in his meetings, and he feels hoarse, almost hollowed out, as if there's nothing more to say. While St. Joseph's expression hasn't changed and Jesus is still ministering to the child in the garden, he feels different somehow. It's as if St. Joseph is still looking down on him, his eyes boring into his soul and he finds something buried deep left to say: "Dear God, Come to his aid, give his body health and his soul comfort in this, his time of need. God, grant him your mercy. Heal him. Please. _Please_. Amen."

oOo

She hears only the last few words and waits by the door, unsure if she should intrude. His head is bowed, his words soft as he recites the prayer, then crosses himself as she's often seen him do. Only when he stands and turns does she hazard a step further into the chapel.

"Bones? Is Pops. . . ?"

She holds up her hand. "He's awake, Booth. I came to get you." She points toward the front of the chapel. "If you need more time. . . ."

He's shaking his head. "No. No, Bones." But he doesn't move.

"I can go and sit with him, Booth."

"No." He starts toward her and when he reaches her he offers his hand.

It's a foreign gesture these days and she takes a moment before putting her hand in his. He immediately brings her hand to his lips and kisses it.

"I love you." He steps closer to her. "I am sorry for having put you through all this."

"You had nothing to do with Hank's heart attack."

His eyes are red-rimmed and liquid. "That's not what I'm talking about, Bones. I've put you through a lot with the gambling and lying to you."

There's a different tone to this Booth, one she labels immediately as sincere.

"And after we see Pops, I was wondering," he says, his voice soft and tentative, "maybe sometime soon you'd have dinner with me and we could talk. I should tell you some things."

His look is. . . hopeful and she takes the opening presented. "We could have breakfast. . . at the house. Today."

There's a hint of a smile on his face, and Booth nods. "Yeah," he says, "I'd like that. Right after we tell Pops to stop scaring us like this."


	25. A New Booth

**A New Booth**

He walks through the house to find her outside on the lawn in the backyard under the sprawling tree where he's put the platform for Christine's tree house. Her face reflects light just beginning to make its way over the horizon in the east.

"Bones?"

"It's beautiful."

The sky brightens slowly glowing red as the sun rises.

"Grams used to say, 'Red sky at dawn, sailors be warned.'"

He can almost hear his grandmother's voice in his head although he can't remember a time living in her house that he'd been up at the crack of dawn.

"Sailors relied on rhymes to help them remember meteorological phenomenon."

"Really?"

"The reddish glow of the sky is caused by clouds or haze related to storms in the region. Clear skies over the horizon light the undersides of moisture-bearing clouds, reflecting back as red."

Bones's always been a walking encyclopedia of information, but he worries now it's an omen.

"Is this a warning for us, Bones?"

Instead of an answer, she gives him another lesson.

"The Aztecs believed that the sun was eaten each night by their god," she says, her arms folded above her swollen belly. "And each morning regurgitated to begin a new day."

"Regurgitated?"

"I know you like that word better than vomited." He feels the early hour in his bones, but he doesn't stop her anthropology lesson. "The Aztecs saw each new day as a new beginning signaled by the sunrise."

He watches her face as the morning light colors the air around them. She's as beautiful as ever, only more so in the dawn of a new day. Beautiful, but tired.

"Maybe you should get some rest, Bones." Despite all the work he's done tonight, he's not sure he's where he should be right now; he's only sure of how much more work he needs to do. "We can talk some other time. I should go."

He turns, but she stops him.

"Would telling me tomorrow change what you need to say today?"

For a full minute he looks at the ground beneath his feet that's turned from a dusky gray to gentle greens. He looks up at Bones.

"It wasn't you, Bones. I love our life together. It wasn't you or Christine. You've got to believe me."

"I went undercover on the gambling case because I didn't want. . . I didn't trust that someone wouldn't die. Like. . . ."

He takes a breath and pushes through the emotion threatening to derail him. "I didn't want someone to die like Sweets did." He sees her face change, that subtle shift that he fell in love with her years ago, when emotions cracked her hard-line rational veneer and he saw her true depth. He imagines there's a kaleidoscope of fragmented emotional threads she's already puzzled together in that brilliant brain of hers. He speaks slowly so that he can catch up to understand himself.

"And I was so. . . angry. . . about what had happened to me. . . I couldn't see the. . . I couldn't feel the guilt, Bones. . . ." The sky is beginning to lose its reddish hues. "I didn't _want_ to feel the guilt about what happened to Sweets."

"And all I've done is hurt you and Christine because I didn't talk about this."

oOo

Booth's explanation takes her back to that day—the frantic search to unlock details of the conspiracy, the offer to pick up documents, the call from Aubrey—and she cannot help but feel the pain once again. Sweets was their baby duck, _their family_, and she relives the time they lost him. Their tears mingle with the promised rain and by the time they finally make their way inside, they are soaked.

"I'll get the towels," she offers, but Booth's hand is on her arm.

"I should go and let you get some rest, Bones." He squeezes her arm. "I need to go back to my place to shower and change and get to the hospital."

This time she takes his arm and she doesn't want to let go. The rainwater pools at their feet as she makes her case. "You're only guilty of not telling Sweets how you felt about him, Booth. You weren't responsible for his death."

Booth blinks; his eyes are red-rimmed. "I know, Bones. That's why I slipped as badly as I did." He grimaces. "I've been going through the motions rather than looking real deep. 'To the very tips of my toes' as my sponsor says. I barely looked past my nose."

"That's not rational, Booth."

"Any more rational than standing here dripping water all over the floor?"

It's a slow grin that develops which encourages her. "You should stay here."

The grin freezes. She almost asks him what he's thinking about before he poses a question. "Bones? Are you sure?"

"Yes." If she isn't sure the moment she says it, logic comes to her aid. "The house is closer to the hospital and I know you, Booth. You'll want to be at the hospital everyday. What with your meetings and work and trying to fit in time to see Christine, it would be far better for you to be here."

The silence makes her wonder if she's said the wrong thing. The upward turn of his grin straightens into a thin line. "And what about us, Bones? You and me?"

She'd done the unthinkable a few weeks ago by metaphorically laying down a gauntlet by removing her wedding ring, and she takes a moment to review everything she's said and done over the past few weeks. It is enough time for Booth to react to her silence.

"It's okay, Bones. I get it. I can stay at the . . . ."

"No!"

The word comes out a bit more emphatically than she intends, but it stops Booth who is turning away from her. Suddenly she is all-too-aware of the coolness on her skin as her wet clothes cling to her, all-too-aware of how her hand is has lost the warmth of Booth's arm.

"You should stay here with me."

The only argument she can make is partly emotional, and she uses it anyway, if only to change the expression on Booth's face—the one he uses in interrogations waiting for suspect to fill in the vacuum of silence.

"I love you, Booth. I know we're better together." She puts both of her hands on his arms. "We trust each other. We nurture each other." Her hands tighten slightly. "Let me help nurture you through this, Booth. Let me help."

His expression softens, but she's not sure if she's won her point.

"Pops once told me that you can't put a kitten in the oven and expect to get a biscuit."

"Because the kitten would eat the biscuit?"

The grin's back and she doesn't fully understand the incongruousness of the story nor his reaction. "No, Bones. You can't put in one thing and expect to get something else out. You know that." He pauses. "I feel I'm on the right track now. I'm always going to be a gambler, but I know how I got here this time, how I got myself into trouble."

"And it would be helpful if I could move back into the house to make it easier to see Pops."

He's not trying to charm his way home; that's evident from his expression even though she's opened the door.

"I already said that you should stay here."

"Stay here, or stay here with you?"

It's a subtle difference as is the change in his expression.

"With me." Of that, she is certain.

The line of his mouth curves upward. "I can't do that, Bones."

She feels the coolness of the temperature in the mudroom, feels the coolness in his words, but while she understands the cause and effect of the former, the latter confuses her. "I don't understand."

"I can't stay here with you unless you wear this." He pulls her wedding ring from his pocket and offers it to her, his eyes hopeful. "Just call it a Catholic thing; my thing."

"What do you say?"

She says nothing but wraps her arms around his neck. As he wraps his arms around her, they both hold on tight.


	26. The Life of Riley

**The Life of Riley**

_**Several weeks later**_

It's a familiar route, one he's taken a bit too frequently when times have been bad, but tonight he has a different purpose. He places the box on the polished top before taking his regular spot. The indoor neon makes it clear that this is a bar, but he's come to think of it as a confessional over the last couple of years.

But tonight it's different.

The bartender finishes drawing two beers when he sees him, and Booth casts a wave toward the ex-priest.

He's left holding his latest talisman, rolling it between his fingers, spinning it on the bar top, letting it crash to the wood with a metallic ring. Sixty days of sober living and he plays with the chip in the same way he played with coins when he was a teen. But now he knows it's one thing to play with a token, another thing to play with what it represents.

"What's this, Booth?" Aldo's sidled up to him on the other side of the bar and is looking at the box. "You've got this bar thing all wrong. You're not supposed to bring your own drinks." He cocks his head toward the bottles behind him. "You're supposed to buy your liquor here. It's how I stay in business."

Booth pushes the box toward him. "It's for you."

"If you haven't noticed, Booth, this is a bar. Lots of liquor."

He persists. "Not like this." He takes the box and opens it to reveal the prize inside. "Forty-year-old single malt scotch." The bottle has classic lines that suggest its pedigree. He nods toward the shelves behind Aldo. "Anything back there is going to taste like kerosene to this."

The label earns something of grudging respect from Aldo who grabs two glasses from the shelf below and sets them on the bar. Then he hesitates. "Maybe I should find out what you want before I drink this."

"Nothing," Booth says as he opens the bottle and pours two fingers of Scotch into the first glass. "I don't want anything. Unless you count inviting you over for dinner on your night off. Bones'll make you something healthy to eat and I'll grill something unhealthy for you." He sets down the bottle and picks up his drink. "You'll have some reason for your Catholic guilt."

"What's this for?" Aldo asks again.

He's used to the suspicious. "Just a thank you."

"Thank you?"

Booth suppresses a grin. "My sponsor calls it the 13th step. Show gratitude to the people who've been tough with you along the way."

That earns a look from Aldo, but little more and they both raise their glasses.

"To the 13th step," Aldo says, but Booth stops him.

"And to my new son," Booth counters.

"_That_ really deserves a drink," Aldo says as he tips the glass toward him. "Congratulations."

They both drink. The whiskey goes down sweet and smooth and he watches for Aldo's reaction.

His ex-confessor seems impressed until he isn't. "I almost forgot that the good stuff warms your throat as it goes down," Aldo offers as he looks over the glass and its contents, "it doesn't leave scorched earth on the way."

"But you couldn't have allowed me to make a little money in toasting your kid?"

It's Aldo's way and he doesn't mind the jab—very little is dimming his mood today.

He's got a new kid, a new job and a new approach to his life that almost always starts and ends with something he's picked up from church or one of his meetings. Or something that his wife has said or he's learned from Pops.

His old confessor leans in. "I take it that Temperance got her way with a home birth."

It's not as dramatic as Christine's birth, but almost. Bones practically had the baby in Christine's tree house, but he got her down in time to make it to the house. Even so he thinks it'll be a story to tell their littlest one, oh, when he has hair under his armpits.

He's nodding, hoping that's enough of an answer, but the ex-priest is onto that trick and he finally relents.

"Guest room. Made Bones happy," he says as he pours himself another shot then fills Aldo's glass, "and made me happy." He's gone from a slow nod to a slower shake of the head. "Although I'm not sure any guest would want to sleep in that room after all that."

It's his standard answer, a chance to be gruff and growly while secretly loving just how great it was to be there to see his son born and hold him until both Bones and the baby were asleep before he walked a couple of feet to put him in his crib for the first time. As many photos as he took of his son and of Bones that night, nothing could really capture the memory.

"To living the life of Riley."

"What?"

"C'mon, Booth. Unless you haven't told me something, like a serial killer is threatening to kill a dozen innocent people unless he gets his favorite parking spot or you've bet a year's salary that we're not going to have a clown or crook in the White House next January, then you've got a good life right now."

"A beautiful wife, great looking kids—since they look like their mothers—a job where the worst thing they can do is shoot you dirty looks. Face it, Booth, you have a good life."

It doesn't take much for him to thank God for his blessings and punctuate the thought with a sip of fine, aged whiskey.

oOo

A quick check of the clock tells her she's woken before her son and she closes her eyes to take in a few precious moments of rest. The house settles around her, groaning at the early morning when her hand strays to Booth's side of the bed and she discovers only cool sheets.

As helpful as Booth is with their son, he's not taken the 2 a.m. feedings because of his new job at Quantico, so she checks the baby monitor as she rises and pulls on a robe and slippers before padding to the nursery.

The baby is not in his crib.

It's a short walk toward the living room where the only glow is coming from the jukebox whose volume is turned down low as Booth feeds their youngest. She lingers at the door.

"Yeah, you better drink up," Booth is cooing to their son. "Lots of veggies in this stuff even though its milk. Your mom will explain how that happens, but I'll explain other things to you. Important things. Yes, I will, little man."

needs are a small hiccup in a busy schedule that includes consulting for a Canadian research project and finishing two books she's committed to while focusing on caring for her children. But there's something in Booth's voice, something in the one-way conversation that draws her in and she leans against the doorframe as Booth shifts the nursing baby in his arms.

"You like this song?" She sees only a chubby fist from her angle. "Yeah. It's a good song. It's one your mom and I dance to, sometimes." His shoulders shift. "First you got to finish eating, little man. Then I teach you to dance."

"Is that a priority, Booth?"

Her comment earns a twist of his head and a smile. "Hey, the music isn't too loud, is it? I thought you could sleep this one out, Bones."

She slides onto the couch beside Booth and rests her head against his shoulder.

"I guess I'm used to waking up." She sighs as she closes her eyes and pulls at her shirt. "I should take over, Booth."

She adjusts her position as they make the hand-off and their son latches on without missing a beat.

"Should I get your stuff?" he asks as he tickles the baby's feet.

"No," she says as she watches her little one's movements. She's never told anyone—certainly not Booth—but her little man's dive toward her breast has always reminded her of Errol Flynn somehow. She dismisses the image.

"Tell me about what you want to teach your son, Booth." It's not meant as a challenge, simply idle curiosity. "Besides dancing, of course."

Booth looks at her, his eyes—are they twinkling?—as he finds a comfortable position to accommodate their son who seems to be doing his own kind of dance with his feet.

"I'd teach him how to dance the foxy trot, and the hippy-hop, and I'd teach him how to do that little two-steppy thing you like so well."

He's smiling as he moves the baby's feet to illustrate his point.

"I'm serious, Booth. I thought you said you wanted to teach him to throw that twirly thing and how to hit a home run into the net and when to spit a ball at the goalie."

She knows that she's mangled the sport idioms, but she enjoys his company and the ease they have with one another. It's one of those "blessings", as Angela calls it, that she does not take for granted.

"You're killing me, Bones. 'Spit a ball at the goalie?'" Their littlest one pauses in his feeding and she shifts him to her other breast which changes Booth's access to his son's feet. She leans against her husband as she tucks her son under an arm so his feet are pressed against the couch.

"What important things do you want to teach your son?"

She knows that he regrets having missed out on parts of Parker's childhood and while he is only a phone call away, he feels the distance between them.

"I'll teach him that twirly thing. . . ."

"No. Really."

He takes in a breath and nods slowly. "I'll teach him to throw a perfect spiral, backhand a puck into the net and throw a spitball—which is illegal, by the way." He looks at the baby tucked under her arm. "I want to teach him to respect himself and respect others. Especially to respect the ones he loves."

His eyes meet hers. "It's easy enough to love someone, Bones. But to respect them? You have to respect yourself. You have to be honest with them and with yourself. It's hard, especially when we make bad decisions or have bad DNA. . . ."

"I don't know if you can say it's bad DNA. . . ."

"It's not _ideal_ DNA. But we face our faults and fight through and in the end, we have a good life."

"A good life?" It's a vague concept, but one she understands on a certain level.

"Yeah," he says. "That's the most important thing I need to teach him. How to have a good life with the people who love him and have his respect."

oOo

The good life is on his mind as he wheels his grandfather under the shade of one of the cherry trees lining the parkway at the nursing home. He's here at least twice a week since the heart attack, something made easier by retiring from the FBI and then becoming an instructor at Quantico.

Summer sun dominates the morning, but here under the cherry tree, the shade is welcome as is the company. He helps his grandfather to ease onto the bench under the tree and settles in next to him.

"This okay, Pops?" he asks as he leans over and adjusts the top of the sweater around his grandfather's shoulder. "You doing okay?"

The older man rumbles. "I'm fine, Seeley. Just don't fuss over me. I'd be just as fine in my room."

"It's a beautiful day, Pops," he counters stretching out on the bench. Days of rainy weather have given way to a sun-washed morning with a light breeze that's perfect for being outside; it's why he's taken the day off from his duties at Quantico. "You need anything?"

"I don't need anything right now, Shrimp." His grandfather grunts as he settles into the seat. He practically swims in the sweater that he insisted on wearing. "The way you fuss over me, makes me think you think I'm going to kick off any minute."

His good mood is darkened a bit by Pops' words as well as by his appearance. He's lost weight and he fears a light breeze could blow him away. "Don't say that, Pops. Don't even put that out into the universe."

"Well, at my age, it's something you have to consider. My ticker's not working like it used to."

He takes a deep breath and holds it, letting the comment pass. Since the heart attack, Pops has been more fatalistic, more fragile and the thought of losing him far too close to the surface. He changes the subject.

"Look what I brought." He pulls out a box. "I think I won the last game."

"I don't think so."

"Sure I did," he counters. "You've got me confused with Jared."

"I'm not so old that I'd do that." Pops points him toward a table on the other side of the trees. "We're playing Old Bill's rules."

He pauses to consider that as he strides toward the table. On his return trip, he questions his grandfather. "I don't think you've ever taught me Old Bill's rules."

"You know, Seeley, no gambling on the outcome." Pops dumps the contents of the box and is eyeing him. "Old Bill W. founded AA and by extension, GA. That's your group isn't it? What they call a support group?"

"I'm not going to gamble, Pops," Booth says. "At least not today."

The eyes remain on him. "This is serious, Seeley. You've got a lot to lose with that gambling. A whole lot more than just money."

"I know, Pops. I know." And he does. He begins to turn over the dominoes and sizes up his grandfather. "I call my sponsor or go to a meeting or I talk to Bones if I have an urge." He levels his gaze with his grandfather's. "I know what to do and I do it."

"You better." He turns over a tile. "I won't always be around to set you straight."

It's the second taunt of the universe, but this one he lets go. "You don't have to worry about me, Pops." His tone is softer. "I know what will happen if I mess up."

This time his grandfather says nothing, so he tries to change the tone of their conversation. "I really think you're wrong, Pops. I think it was Jared you beat last time."

"You don't think I know the difference between you and your brother?"

"Well, you did say that your eyesight was a bit hazy." He grins at his grandfather. But the gentle teasing hasn't changed Pops' focus.

"I know that you will do the right thing, but I'm not so sure about your brother." He takes in his grandfather's words. "You're a strong man. And I don't just mean physically. You're strong where it counts, Seeley. But not Jared."

He puts down the domino he's been holding. "Jared's strong."

"No, Seeley." Pops is emphatic. "Not like you. He's not the man you are. You only become that when you face your problems and deal with them. You understand me? Jared hasn't done that." Pops taps the table and points at him. "You have."

He knows what a train wreck Jared's life can be and he nods.

"You have to promise me something, Seeley. You have to promise to look after Jared and keep him out of trouble." His eyes are centered on his. "You understand, son?"

"I do."

"He came over to see me with one of those Navy types." Pops' voice betrays his feelings. "I didn't trust him. Not at all. Jared saved your life to get cashiered out of the Navy. This other one? He's shifty. The man's shifty. And I don't trust him."

"You understand me?"

The thought sobers him. Years as an MP had taught his grandfather more than a few things about people and he accepts his judgment. "I understand."

"Good."

For a moment, he lets everything sink in. He's been doing that a lot of late, soaking in advice, soaking in experiences, especially those with his grandfather. It's part of the program, part of living in the moment, part of a new approach. The memories of having practically gambled away the best parts of his life seem almost as far away from the present as the one wisp of cloud marring the perfect blue of the sky.

"You know, I'm very proud of you, Seeley." Pops gives him that same look he often earned as a boy when the man who came to be his guardian wanted to impart some special kind of wisdom. "You've become the man I always hoped you'd be."

His eyes feel liquid as he thanks his grandfather. "My sponsor would say I'm still a work in progress."

"Well don't you screw it up," he continues as he leans in. "Temperance is a real keeper, she is. She's strong, too. And you need a woman like her to call you on your crap, Seeley."

It feels like his grandfather is steering him in two different directions, but he welcomes it as he agrees fully with him. "Bones is the best."

"You're darned right she is, Shrimp." Pops is on a roll. "Your grandmother was the same way. She wouldn't take guff from anyone. I remember a time. . . ."

The memory ends almost as it begins with a cry of "Gran-pops!" Christine's practically flying across the lawn while Bones trails pushing the baby carriage.

"Is that the little monkey?" Pops leans forward to see better. "You didn't say they were coming."

He didn't know. His heart practically somersaults seeing them. "I guess she wanted you to meet the newest Booth, Pops." He stands and slides the table safely out of the way. "Bones had one of those Skype meetings with her publisher today. Must have finished early."

"I'm glad she did, Shrimp." Pops bends down to accept Christine's hug and when they separate, his grandfather holds her at arms length to look her over. "She looks just like Temperance." He glances up at him. "That's a good thing for her."

Christine's giggling just as Bones wheels in their youngest. He can't help but stand by her side and hold her hand feeling the hardness of the ring in the soft embrace.

"Christine wanted to see you, Hank. And she thought it would be a good idea to introduce you to her brother."

"Seeley said the two of you hadn't decided on a name." Pops' hand shakes as he touches the baby who is just as curious and just as unsteady, grinning his toothless smile, his eyes somewhat unfocused as he reaches out. "This handsome fellow really needs a name, Shrimp."

Christine's looking between him and Pops, looking as if she will burst. A glance at Bones tells him all he needs to know.

"We've named him, Hank. After you, Pops."

A tear courses down his grandfather's cheek, but it does little to dilute the old man's gruffness. "I know that's my name, Shrimp. It's a fine name, Temperance."

Little Hank looks at Big Hank and grins, but before Bones can give a slightly squinty explanation of how baby's eyes aren't really focused, Pops reaches out a finger that the smallest Booth grabs onto.

"Thank you, Seeley."

"He's also named after my Uncle Sweets."

Pops wrinkles his nose at Christine's contribution. "You shouldn't have done that, Shrimp," he says. "With a middle name like Sweets, he's going to be fighting off the girls on the playground every day. Noo-o, that's not a good idea."

Christine can't answer since she's giggling, so it's up to Bones to set things straight. "Hank, his middle name is Lance. We wanted his name to reflect the love we have for two very special people in our lives."

Pops' wink betrays him and he offers his free hand to Christine. "Why don't you crawl on up here and help me beat this jamocca in a game, huh? You can keep an eye on him for me."

Christine scrambles onto the seat next to her great-grandfather and settles in as he sets the table back amid Pop's half-serious calls to avoid losing any tiles. Little Hank isn't letting go—or is it Pops?—and the five of them sit around the table and he and Bones help to turn over the rest of the tiles.

"Christine and this little guy and I are a team," Pops declares. "We'll play you two, but you're separate. And none of that ESP, psychic, voodoo stuff you two do."

"I get it," he says. "Bones and I are going to beat your butt even though we're not playing together."

"Oh, you think so, Shrimp?"

The emphasis is on his nickname and Christine giggles and Bones flashes him a look—and all he knows is that he's sitting down to play a game and the only stakes in all of this is how much time they'll spend together and how much fun they'll have under a welcoming sky. He pauses just a bit too long for his grandfather.

"You okay there, Seeley?" Pops gives him that look and he shakes it off.

"I'm better than okay, Pops," he says. "I've got my 4 favorite people here and I'm having a great time. I'm living the life of Riley."

And he is. He looks at all the people around him and sees the best bet he's ever made.

"Then shut up, Shrimp and play the game."

oOo

**Author's note: **This is it. Thank you to everyone who's stuck with this story for all the starts and stops and Bones-like hiatuses. We learn to be a patient bunch, don't we?

I'm going back to finish my other two stories before the show ends which, given how slowly I write, is going to be a feat.


End file.
